By Brian Bielanski, Editor
(RacingWire) – You might not know it by following the national media but there are actually two races going on in Florida this weekend. One race testing men and their mettle while the other race tests men and their metal.
While the candidates for president continue their version of “have at it boys” about 200 of the finest sports car drivers in the world have converged on Daytona International Speedway for the 50th Anniversary Rolex 24 hour race.
In addition to sports car regulars, drivers come from Formula One, Sprint Cup and IndyCar are on hand to battle the Daytona's road course. Names like Andretti, Fittipaldi, Rahal, Montoya, McMurray, Dixon, and Franchitti will all strap in to take on the twice around the clock test that is the Rolex 24.
With drivers from more than a dozen countries and marques like Ferrari, Porsche, BMW, Audi, Corvette and Ford the race has a true international flair.
Don’t take my word for it… take from racing legends A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti.
Foyt is a four-time Indy 500 winner. He’s also won the Daytona 500, the Rolex 24 and the 24 Hours of LeMans.
Foyt recalls how his preparation for the Rolex was no different than Indy or the Daytona 500.
“When you go into a big race like this here,” said Foyt “you don't wait until the day you get there. It starts working on you probably a month or so before. I know it did on me, and probably the only one I ever went to just kind of overnight was the first one we won where I was going to drive for Darrell. That was kind of an overnight deal.”
“But no, whenever I've had a big race or go into a big sports car race, a week or two, it really works on you, and you want to make sure you know the course good, you want to make sure the car is good, and you just work at it, you know.”
Unlike the cars Andretti drove most of this weekend’s Rolex 24 cars will be running at the finish.
“The great thing about today, too, the cars are so reliable, so you're going to have probably 98 percent of the field running at the end,” said Andretti. “It always makes for a hell of a race like that, and as you said, with all the new equipment, factories involved, the new Corvette there and the Grand-Am class, it's actually worthy of the 50th anniversary, no question.”
The green flag drops on the 50th running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona, Saturday January 28 at 3:30 p.m. ET.
