Olivier Pla Tag

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer DAYTONA — After years of unreliability that made Mazda an afterthought, the Japanese brand brought their lead RT24-P across the finish line in second place in the 2020 Rolex 24 at Daytona. The No. 77 Mazda Team Joest DPi started on pole position and led 190 of 833 laps with Oliver Jarvis, Olivier Pla and Tristan Nunez sharing driving duties. However, the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season opener escaped the Multimatic-based prototype by just over a minute. Their opening pace could not be replicated late inRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer WATKINS GLEN, New York — After years of futility, Mazda Team Joest has finally triumphed overall in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in Sunday’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen with a 1-2 finish. Jonathan Bomarito, Harry Tincknell and Olivier Pla brought the No. 55 RT24-P DPi machine across the line just .353 seconds ahead of the No. 77 RT24-P of Oliver Jarvis, Tristan Nunez and Timo Bernhard. The pair were 11.783 seconds ahead of third place and two laps ahead of sixth place. Full seasonRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer SEBRING, Fla.– The 67th Annual Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring starts within the hour so let’s make some last minute predictions. Overall winner: No. 55 Mazda. Jonathan Bomarito, Harry Tincknell and Olivier Pla are wheeling the car that will start seventh and they were very quick during practice on Thursday. Mazda Team Joest are looking to turn around their luck after how Daytona ended and let’s see if they can do it here. DPi Dark Horse: No. 54 CORE Autosport Nissan DPi. CORE Autosport areRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer SEBRING, Fla. — The No. 47 Precision Performance Motorsports Lamborghini Huracan GT3 entry for the 67th Annual Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring crashed during Thursday’s second practice session at the 3.74 mile circuit. Coming out of the first turn, Don Yount was getting up to speed after having just completed his second flying lap but then he hit a bump that unsettled the car. That unsettling caused Yount to go off track and hit the wall heavily coming through Turn 2. “I got on theRead More

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer 47 cars started the long and grueling 57th edition of the Rolex 24 at Daytona, and despite a major downpour in the second half, 10 entries weren’t sitting in the pits when the race was rain-shortened. Prior to the heavy rains that stopped the race a record two times, it was reliability issues involving multiple entries including class favorites. Just over an hour into the race, the No. 99 NTG Motorsport Porsche GTD hit the tire barriers at the West Horseshoe. Other than cosmetic damage, all appearedRead More

By IMSA Wire Service DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (Jan. 24, 2019) – After two-and-a-half weeks as unofficial track record holders, Oliver Jarvis and Mazda Team Joest can finally, officially, call themselves track record holders on the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway road circuit after qualifying for this weekend’s 57th Rolex 24 At Daytona. With six minutes and 10 seconds remaining in the 15-minute qualifying session Thursday afternoon, Jarvis took the Motul Pole Award with a lap of 1 minute, 33.685 seconds (136.792 mph) in the No. 77 Mazda RT24-P DPi car. AndRead More

By Christopher DeHarde, Staff Writer The IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship heads to one of America’s most iconic natural terrain road courses in Watkins Glen International for the Sahlen’s 6 Hours of the Glen. The race is the third in the Tequila Patron North American Endurance Cup and as such, the entry list is larger than normal. The race also is taking place near the July 4th holiday and in classic Independence Day motorsports tradition, IMSA has asked the team to use patriotic liveries for their cars with much of theRead More

By IMSA Wire Service SEBRING, Fla. – The 66th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts is now one third of the way in the books and the No. 7 Acura Team Penske Acura ARX-05 DPi car shared by Helio Castroneves, Ricky Taylor and Graham Rahal led the way at the four-hour mark. The No. 7 Acura DPi has been among the front-runners throughout the week at Sebring, leading practice on Thursday and qualifying third in the hands of Taylor, a defending champion of both theRead More

By IMSA Wire Service SEBRING, Fla. – For the second consecutive year, Tristan Vautier will start the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts on the pole. This season, however, when he takes the green flag Saturday, there won’t be any cars in front of him. That’s because his Motul Pole Award in 2017 came in the GT Daytona (GTD) class driving a Mercedes-AMG – the first in history for the German manufacturer. This time around, it’s in the top Prototype class driving the No. 90Read More

Daytona Beach, Fla. (31 January 2016) – Setting a race-leading pace as the team looked to win a second title at the “World Center of Racing,” Michael Shank Racing with Curb/Agajanian delivered an impressive performance in the opening 285 laps of the 2016 Rolex 24 At Daytona. With new and returning commercial partnerships including Curb Records, Tire Kingdom, Florida Lottery, and Zak Products joining the No. 60 Honda-Ligier effort for the 54th running of the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the event was a highly anticipated one for the 2012 RolexRead More