A Survey of Corvettes from HSR Classic 24 & Sprint races at Daytona
HSR at Daytona delivers 24 hours of non-stop action. Cars from six (6) groups (organized by decade) compete in four (4) stints, each lasting an hour. They ladder up starting 1 PM Saturday, run through the night and finish at 1 PM on Sunday.
A series of Sprint races from Thursday thru Saturday morning is also a good tune-up for entrants in the Classic 24 test for survival.
Watch Canaan O’Connell, son of Corvette HOF driver Johnny O’Connell muscle his way to victory in the fearsome # 55 C4 ex Dave Heinz IMSA GT1.
# 55 video: https://skiautosports.com/2022/11/04/video-canaan-oconnells-daytona-charge/
SkiAutosports is led by the vibrant husband-and-wife team of Kent and Melissa Hussey from Atlanta.
Watch Le Mans Gold rated and former Grand Am Series driver Matt Bell rescue from disaster the # 60 C4 ex Almo Copelli Le Mans Callaway Supernatural.
# 60 video Matt Bell: https://skiautosports.com/2022/11/05/video-save-of-the-century/
Pushing through the infield section, braking and blasting onto the banking lap after lap can punish tires beyond belief on monster cars like these.
Matt was clocking 160 mph when a tire exploded coming out of NASCAR turn 4.
John Reisman just missed winning Group E in his # 33 ex-Whelen 2014 Corvette DPi. With only a few laps to finish the fourth and final stint, the engine overheated and teammate Pro driver Eric Curran had to nurse the car home.
That allowed Adam Lindemann, 10 seconds off pace in the # 09 ex Troy Flis Spirit of Daytona 2014 Corvette DPi to slip by.
Bobby Kennedy fought off Porsches and others to win the Group 9 sprint race in Rob Logsdon’s potent C3 Corvette retro creation powered by a NASCAR 366 cu in engine. It’s been trimmed out like the # 11 1971 Owens Corning Team car.
Two more Corvettes from the C3 shark era took up both the sprint races and Group A in the Classic 24.
Walo Bertschinger and Dario Tosolini in the # 39 1968 ex Wylie Doran IMSA Corvette completed all four stages.
Chris Ronson Sr. and Jr. in their # 94 1970 Corvette did not have the luck.
Same for Neil Merry and Christian Dick who came all the way from the UK to race the # 11 replica of the 1973 Budd-Sponsored Corvette that Tony DeLorenzo destroyed in a street race that year at Pontiac MI.
Pierce Marshall and Eric Foss shared the driving in the Group 9 sprint races in the # 3 C7-R Chassis 005 built by Pratt & Miller in 2016.
Henry Gilbert was two places behind in his # 23 C7 silhouette bodied TA/GT1 also built in 2016.
Ken Gold in his # 9 C6 ZO6 from 2010 was another 14 spots back.
The bittersweet saga in a nutshell of HSR at Daytona
Historic Sports Car Racing (HSR) made ends meet for years, supported by a contingent of Porsche enthusiasts from Florida.
HSR’s first outing on Nov 12-15, 2014 began a pilgrimage to “the Speedway” by racers from all over the US and from 20 countries abroad.
It blossomed into a huge variety of cars and folks from different places and offered lots of track time.
The SCCA Trans-Am series also held its finale at HSR Daytona.
Those revenues vanished when Parella Holdings acquired the series and moved the finale to Circuit of the Americas in Austin.
HSR management found itself at odds to cover Daytona’s rising rental fees while losing money on attempts to expand beyond the southeast.
Its acquisition by IMSA, triggered by Covid-19 travel lockdowns was a bit of a godsend. The organization overcome damage from Hurricane Ian and now the only way to go is up.
Photo credits
Larry VanScoy, John Avery, Chris Clark
