At least nine drivers with NASCAR ties are scheduled to test Grand American Rolex Sports Car Series cars Thursday through Saturday at Daytona International Speedway in preparation for the Jan. 28-29 running of the Rolex 24 At Daytona. Defending Nextel Cup champion Tony Stewart and recently retired Rusty Wallace are on the entry list for testing. They will be teammates – but in different cars – for Howard-Boss Motorsports. Ganassi Racing driver Casey Mears will be part of Ganassi’s driver lineup, which includes former Cup driver Scott Pruett, who still drives road-course Cup events. Two-time Busch Series champion Randy LaJoie is on the entry list, as are Mexican drivers Adrian Fernandez and Michel Jourdain, who ran partial schedules in the Busch Series last year. NBC commentator and former Cup driver Wally Dallenbach will also participate.(NASCAR Scene Daily Newsletter), also Northeast short-tracker Ted Christopher and former Truck/Busch Series driver David Donohue will run the race.(Elmira Star Gazette)(1-5-2006)
MORE NASCAR Ties: other drivers with “NASCAR Ties”:
Christian Fittipaldi (Cup/Busch); Butch Leitzinger (Cup/Busch); Darrin Brassfield (Cup in 1989); Tommy Riggins (Cup/Busch); Jack Baldwin (Busch); Tommy Archer (Trucks); Mike Borkowski (Busch/Trucks); Tony Ave (Cup start); Chris Bingham (Busch); Ron Fellows is testing the #40 with Bingham this week in Daytona and could end up running the race.(Mike Paz, DIS PR Announcer)(1-6-2006)
PLUS: NASCAR NBC Broadcaster and racing legend, Benny Parsons, will be the grand marshal of the Rolex 24 At Daytona.(1-9-2006)
WINNERS The team of Dan Wheldon, Scott Dixon and Casey Mears survived the Rolex 24 to give car owner Chip Ganassi a victory in America’s most prestigious sports car endurance event. Reigning Indy Racing League champion and Indianapolis 500 winner Wheldon, former IRL champ Dixon and NASCAR star Mears drove together for the first time and put together a solid effort on the way to victory Sunday. Avoiding major trouble was the key in this grueling twice-around-the-clock battle that saw seven different leaders, all of them among the 31 Daytona Prototypes that started at the front of the 66-car field at 12:10 p.m. Saturday. The winning Lexus Riley covered 734 laps and 2,613.04 miles on Daytona International Speedway’s 3.56-mile, 14-turn road circuit. That was good for a one-lap victory over the Lexus Riley of Champ Car teammates A.J. Allmendinger and Justin Wilson and Oswaldo Negri and Mark Patterson. The winner among the 400-horsepower GT entries was the Porsche GT3 Cup car driven by Randy Pobst, Michael Levitas, Ian Baas and Spencer Pumpelly, finishing ninth overall. NASCAR drivers Rusty Wallace and Tony Stewart fell out of the race with mechanical problems.(ESPN.com/AP)
INFO: more information about the race at grandamerican.com, Daytona Beach News Journal, Daytona Intl Speedway site or daytona24hr.com..(1-29-2006)
