Monday 26th January 2015

Motorsport on Monday: 26/1/15

2015 begins for the WRC and US sportscars, controversy abounds!

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The first big race and the first big rally of 2015 both ran this weekend; over in the US, the Daytona 24 Hours kicked off the second year of the United Sportscar Championship, while the Monte Carlo Rally waved the flag for WRC.

Seb back to make Seb look slow. Until the crash

Big news in WRC was the return of Sebastian Loeb in the DS3 WRC. After 15 months away, he was sensational. No exaggeration: on the opening stage of the rally, he was a full half-minute faster than reigning champion Sebastien Ogier's Volkswagen Motorsport Polo WRC, and 22 seconds ahead of the next-fastest runner. For most drivers, the icy stage was a nightmare; Loeb simply called it 'tricky'.

This is, officially, a one-off run for the nine-time world champion but, leading overnight on the first day, many were already dreaming of double-figure world championships. Alas, they came crashing back to earth on Friday when Loeb, um, crashed. a seemingly innocuous tap into a rock tore the rear nearside suspension, losing him minutes and effectively handing the rally victory to Ogier - he duly cruised to the rally win. Not that Loeb gave up, mind: Citroen fixed under Rally2 regs, he raced back up to eighth place by the finish.

A sight (and sound!) to behold

It was a more successful recovery than Robert Kubica. The fast but erratic Pole, now ambitiously running his own RK World Rally Team in a last-minute deal, had a troubled initial few days but starred on Saturday morning, 'doing a Loeb' and ending the opening stage over 30 seconds ahead of anyone else. He was similarly quick in the other stages - before sadly crashing on SS14. This time, though, it wasn't his fault: oddly, he hit a wall after the end of the stage, because he lost his brakes. He'll be back. Question is, will Loeb?

Oh, and we can't mention Monte Carlo 2015 without celebrating the launch of the new five-round FIA R-GT series for GT cars - and for Francois Delecour's brilliance behind the wheel of the sublime Tuthill Porsche 911. He won by nearly three minutes, taking Porsche's first Monte Carlo win since 1978. Next up is the Geko Ypres Rally in June; we can't wait.

53 cars for the 53rd Daytona 24

Time for Rolex 24
The Daytona 24 Hours - or #Rolex24 if you're a tweeter - fittingly boasted a 53-car grid for the 53rd running of the event. There was a bit of an upset before the race started when the LMP2 Michael Shank Racing Ligier-Honda JSP2 of Oswaldo Negri Jr won pole over the Chip Ganassi Riley-Ford Ecoboost Daytona Prototype of Scott Dixon. Juggling the balance of performance between the heavier but more powerful DPs and the lighter, higher-downforce LMP2s kept regulators busy throughout the inaugural season of USC; while the DPs invariably triumphed, the LMP2s were getting closer by the end of the season and some are saying it won't be long before they win outright.

Not this time though: the highest-finishing LMP2 car was the pole-sitting Michael Shank Racing car, and that was back in 11th. Instead, it was a battle between Chevrolet and Ford-powered DPs as the Action Express Racing Coyote Chevrolet Corvette fought it out with the Chip Ganassi Riley-Ford and, up until near the end, the Wayne Taylor Racing Dallara-Chevrolet. But then the most bizarre call saw WTR racer Jordan Taylor pit during a yellow flag, and hand over the car to his brother Ricky. With the subsequent penalty pit run served shortly after, it dropped the family team from victory contenders to distant third place runners.

Ford's new Ecoboost racer made its debut

And why? Because Jordan was about to break the rule that says a driver can't be in the car for longer than four hours in any six-hour period! Painful: the mind turns to the 1949 24 Hours of Le Mans, when Luigi Chinetti drove for more than 23 hours to win the race because his team-mate, Baron Selsdon of Scotland, was allegedly 'under the influence'...

Daytona is a race dominated by yellow flags and this year was no exception; there were 18 of them - one caused by a curious coming together between the GTLM factory Core Autosport Porsche 911 RSRs. Car #911 of quick Brit Nick Tandy, then being driven by Mark Lieb, was nerfed by an out-of-control car #912 driven by Earl Bamber who plunged sideways into his teammate after apparently being forced onto the grass while passing the 007 Aston Martin. See here for the video. As they were racing rather aggressively, it's not quite as clear-cut as it seems; Porsche head of motorsport Dr. Frank-Steffen Walliser rather ominously called it "a very difficult race with a disappointing result for us. There is nothing to gloss over.

Corvette wins GTLM at its home race

"We can't blame the drivers for the accident, things like this happen," he added, presumably under instruction by the PR team. "It's just a shame that we dashed all our chances through this... we leave this weekend with a bitter aftertaste." Blameless Tandy at least looked on the bright side: "The positive thing is that we were doing really well up until the incident."

At the end, it was Chip Ganassi Racing's Scott Dixon, Tony Kanaan, Jamie McMurray and Kyle Larson that won by 1.3 seconds over Action Express Racing's Joao Barbosa, Christian Fittipaldi and Sebastien Bourdais, the latter recovering admirably after losing time earlier in the race after an electrical issue stranded the car out on track. In GTLM, the Chevrolet Corvette C7.R of Antonio Garcia, Jan Magnussen and Ryan Briscoe pipped the racy Rahal BMW Z4 GTE, and they all too got the special Rolex winners' watches on the podium.

Indeed, post-race interviews with the winners all seemed to mention the watches, Kanaan excitedly exclaiming: "I love watches!". It was great to see and proves that racers are human after all...

[Images: LAT]

[ravon]

Thank you MotorsTV for giving us excellent coverage of Daytona and the only coverage of the Monte !

[Pwig]

The Monte had loads of coverage on BT Sport.

[Alex Langheck]

Quite a weekend of motorsport. The Monte was good, if not great; should end at night, not Sunday lunchtime. And at just over 221 miles, is hardly the Endurance event it once was. And a VW 1,2,3 doesn't bode well for the rest of the season. I just hope the others can match the VW panzerwagen.

Daytona is the only 24 hour race I can't get into; I watched it here and there, and followed it on Twitter, but I'm not sure what it is. N24, Le Mans and Spa are all magic, but Daytona, just doesn't have it for me. Maybe its because the organisers think its bigger than it actually is - it was a great race, not sure it still is. Just don't start me on DP's v P2....

[Graham]

Alex Langheck said:

Maybe its because the organisers think its bigger than it actually is -

you should try watching it on site... every 5 mins over the tanoy..." here at the Worlds Center for Motorsport"

I still enjoyed my visit quite a few years a go now though

[richardaucock]

Alex Langheck said:

Quite a weekend of motorsport. The Monte was good, if not great; should end at night, not Sunday lunchtime. And at just over 221 miles, is hardly the Endurance event it once was. And a VW 1,2,3 doesn't bode well for the rest of the season. I just hope the others can match the VW panzerwagen.

Daytona is the only 24 hour race I can't get into; I watched it here and there, and followed it on Twitter, but I'm not sure what it is. N24, Le Mans and Spa are all magic, but Daytona, just doesn't have it for me. Maybe its because the organisers think its bigger than it actually is - it was a great race, not sure it still is. Just don't start me on DP's v P2....

Keen to hear any views you have on DP v LMP2, Alex!

[oldtimer2]

After reading about the LMP2 Michael Shank Racing Ligier-Honda JSP2 and the Action Express Racing Coyote Chevrolet Corvette and others I was left wondering which team on the grid boasted the longest name.

[richardaucock]

oldtimer2 said:

After reading about the LMP2 Michael Shank Racing Ligier-Honda JSP2 and the Action Express Racing Coyote Chevrolet Corvette and others I was left wondering which team on the grid boasted the longest name.

I was thinking that as I wrote them, too...

[renaultgeek]

more pics of the 911 at the monte!

[BSC]

In contrast to the article winning the first special stage by Sebastien Loeb was helped by his choice of tyres, not driving better than Ogier. Loeb definitely is still a hell of a rallye driver but not 30 sec better than Ogier on a 20 km stage. OK, choosing the best tyre is the drivers duty and experience, but on this first stage it was a lottery, so Loeb won and Ogier lost, mostly due to tyre choice, not driving skills.