Rolex 24 couldn’t outrun NASCAR’s heavy hand

The Rolex 24 from Daytona signaled the first race since the merger of the American Le Mans Series and the NASCAR-owned Grand Am series. While the homologation of the cars proved difficult indeed, the race control seems to have been all NASCAR.

With a handful of minutes left in the race, a pedestrian off from a Porsche prompted officials to throw a yellow flag for full-course caution. Not a local yellow, which is typical for this type of incident, but a full-course caution which can only been seen as a NASCAR-style “competition caution”. That may thrill fans at Talladega but for Sports Car fans, it’s a patronizing move and it’s a unfortunate way to complete a 24-hour grueling race regardless of the “excitement” of a “shootout”.

If that were the only heavy-handed move by race officials, perhaps fans could live with the thought that the first race post-merger was an eventful affair but that isn’t the end. Race officials decided, almost instantaneously, to penalize the GTD class winning Ferrari #555 from Level 5 Motorsports for avoidable contact with the Flying Lizard Audi #45…which is somewhat odd as there was no contact made between the two cars.

The rules may say that actual contact doesn’t have to take place for the avoidable contact penalty but fans were incensed by the call as they, and many drivers such as David Brabham, voiced their frustration on Twitter. It was an amazing response time for the penalty to occur which, quite honestly, was faster than I’ve seen from Formula 1, NASCAR or Le Mans. A shame to penalize Level 5 Motorsports for two professional drivers scrapping to the end. Isn’t that racing?

As it was, Joao Barbosa, Christian Fittipaldi and  Sebastien Bourdais took the Prototype win in the Action Express racing Corvette and it can’t be ignored just how saturating the General Motors (GM) presence was at the race. It was almost the GM Corvette 24 hours at Daytona. I’m as excited as the next person to see GM involved but there were many story lines such as Mazda’s Diesel, Porsche’s new North American challenger, Audi’s increased approach to USC and the new Ford EcoBoost motor in the Ganassi team’s car.

The other challenge was the homologation which slowed the PC class cars down and made the Daytona Prototypes the class of the field and while they have come a long way, I would have liked to see some parity with these two classes. It’s difficult to find motivation if you are a PC class challenger when the GT Le Mans class cars are beating you.

In the end, the merger was successful, the racing had some of the best drivers in years and the GTD class was a lot of fun to watch. In all, the United Sportscar Championship would have been much better off if they had adopted the ALMS officiating and rule book as well. Applying NASCAR-style regulations, race control and penalty justification has left a sour taste in true sportscar fans mouths. If they wanted NASCAR, they’d watch NASCAR.

This series could be very popular as long as the NASCAR nuance remains muted. The teams, drivers and sport could use a new, combined officiating and regulatory system that perhaps IMSA could provide leaving NASCAR politics behind and placing real American road racing at the forefront.

Will fans continue to watch? Sure, but when it starts to feel and act like a NASCAR version of road racing, they may be looking for the ALMS again. Oh, could someone enlighten me as to what April Rose actually does during race weekends and what insight does she bring to the race or broadcast? A women parading around the paddock in a skin-tight spandex suit with cleavage for days smiling and waving for the camera is about as patronizing as the penalty for Level 5 Motorsports and the “competition caution”. I’m sure she’s a delightful woman but come on…

There were some great moments in the race but also some very scary moments and for this, I commend USC for their quick action. An early crash between Memo Gidley and Matteo Malucelli. Gidley suffered a broken back and has had surgery on his arm and leg. Both drivers were awake and communicative so the signs are good but it was a very scary moment indeed as fans around the world held their collective breath.

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