DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - A trio of Canadian drivers will be looking to win in their home country Friday when the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16 visits Montreal and the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve for the Montreal 200.
Mark Wilkins of Toronto, Michael Valiante of Vancouver and Marc-Antoine Camirand of Quebec will be competing in the series’ premier Daytona Prototype class, while Montreal native Sylvain Tremblay, Jean-Francois Dumoulin of Trois-Rivieres and veteran Toronto driver Ron Fellows lead a group of Canadians racing in the GT division.
The only Canadian team in the Grand-Am Rolex Series, AIM Autosport, has been one of the most improved teams in the paddock in 2008. The team has raised its sights, finishing a career-best fourth at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, and has five top 10s, though none have come in the last two races. The team would like for that to change this weekend.
The team flexed new-found Ford muscle at the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona, when each of the team’s drivers had the car in the lead at the end of their opening shift. The team ran with the leaders until several nighttime incidents dropped them out of contention.
Since then, AIM Autosport has been a frontrunner, finishing in the top eight in five of the following six races and ran seventh in the team standings. Wilkins won the team’s first pole at Daytona in July, while in the most recent event, Brian Frisselle passed series front-runners Scott Pruett and Alex Gurney late in the race and led 15 laps, only to have his engine fail with 13 laps remaining.
“We’ve been looking for podium finishes at recent races, but we’re looking for a win at Montreal, ” said Wilkins, who co-drives the No. 61 Exchange Traded Gold /Mike Direct Connect/Telux Ford Riley with Frisselle. “We led here quite a bit last year, and it was one of our best races last season. This is a race that we’re really targeting to be ‘our race.”
This weekend, Wilkins hopes previous experience here will help him find the top step on the podium. Frisselle led six laps here last year, with the team posting a seventh-place finish.
Another Canadian looking for victory this weekend is Michael Valiante - which would be a repeat performance for SunTrust Racing. Last year, Max Angelelli teamed with Jan Magnussen and came home a winner. This year, Valiante is Angelelli’s new co-driver on a new car, as the No. 10 team switched to the Dallara chassis this year. Valiante, who won a pair of poles and led in six of the opening seven races in 2008, finishing a season-best third in the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen.
Open-wheel star Marc-Antoine Camirand of Saint Leonard d’Aston, Quebec, co-drives the No. 09 Spirit of Daytona Porsche Coyote with Guy Cosmo. Montreal is one of the selected races the team is running in 2008. Camirand won here in 2004 in the Hankook Tire Touring Car race.
The three Canadians have joined the remainder of the Daytona Prototype field with a common goal - trying to stop the TELMEX Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Lexus Riley of Pruett and Memo Rojas. The pair, which finished fifth here last year, won six of the opening nine races - including the Rolex 24 of Daytona (joined by Juan Pablo Montoya and Dario Franchitti) and the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen, where Pruett drove the final three hours in 90-degree heat. They hold a 60-point lead (295-235) over last year’s champions Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty.
Gurney and Fogarty have struggled throughout this season after winning seven of 14 events last year in the No. 99 GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing Pontiac Riley. They were winless through the opening seven rounds of 2008 before finally breaking through in the rain at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Since then, Gurney was passed on the final lap by Pruett in the Daytona event earlier this month, and the car’s clutch failed after Gurney led the most laps at Barber Motorsports Park.
Riley-Matthews Motorsports won in Mexico City with drivers Jim Matthews and Marc Goossens. Cheever Racing had its best showing of 2007 in Montreal, when rookie Antonio Garcia led three laps en route to a fourth-place finish. Garcia has competed in eight of the nine Rolex Series races this season, and welcomes back former co-driver Christian Fittipaldi, who spent 2006 and 2007 as the team’s lead driver. In addition to the Daytona Prototype run last season, Fittipaldi has competed at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Formula 1 and the former Champ Car World Series.
Other teams have been closing in on victory this season. Brumos Porsche posted back-to-back runner-up finishes with Toronto-born Darren Law and David Donohue; Michael Shank Racing had both of its Ford Rileys on the front row for the Rolex 24 At Daytona; Doran Racing has been running near the front with its two Dallaras; Krohn Racing is running the new Lola chassis, with its two-car lineup including Formula 1 veteran Ricardo Zonta and Nic Jonsson in the No. 76 Pontiac and Tracy Krohn teamed with Oliver Gavin in the No. 75 Pontiac; and Rum Bum Racing led the most laps at Mid-Ohio with rookies Matt Plumb and Gene Sigal.
Canadians Tremblay, Dumoulin and Fellows Lead GT Teams
Tremblay and co-driver Nick Ham look to continue their upswing at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in the No. 70 SpeedSource Mazdaspeed/Castrol Syntec Mazda RX-8. With two poles and two victories in as many races (Brumos Porsche 250 and Porsche 250 at Barber), the duo is inching closer to GT point leaders Kelly Collins and Paul Edwards in the No. 07 Banner Racing Banner Engineering Pontiac GXP. R, with only 14 points separating the teams (292-278). The SpeedSource sister car, the Watkins Glen-winning No. 69 machine driven by Emil Assentato and Jeff Segal, looks to rebound from two straight 17th-place finishes.
After winning three races early in the season, Collins and Edwards have been off the podium in three straight events. They look for better results at Montreal, where they placed eighth last year despite running third on the final lap. The sister Banner car, the No. 06 Pontiac GXP. R that finished fifth here last year, is slated to be driven by team owner Leighton Reese and Canadian native Ron Fellows, who will also drive Dale Earnhardt Jr. ‘s Nationwide Series car in the Saturday race.
With one victory in 10 GT events in 2008, Porsche will be looking to return to the form that saw it win here last year and take three of the top four positions. Andy Lally, who teamed with RJ Valentine to win last year’s race, returns to lead four Porsche GT3s entered by TRG, which is seeking its first race victory since last year at Montreal. Lally will co-drive with Tim George Jr. in the No. 67 entry, while Valentine teams with Bryan Sellers in the No. 68 Porsche GT3. Also entered are the No. 65 TRG/Riegel Autosport Porsche GT3 driven by Craig Stanton and Canadian Hima Maher and the No. 66 TRG Porsche GT3 driven by Ted Ballou and Spencer Pumpelly.
Dirk Werner and Bryce Miller of the No. 87 Farnbacher Loles Racing Porsche GT3 look to continue their hot streak, with two consecutive second-place finishes in the past two races. The pair also finished second in the 2007 Montreal 200. Leh Keen and Eric Lux of the No. 86 Farnbacher Loles Racing Porsche won at Mid-Ohio, and the team’s third car, the No. 88 Porsche, is slated to be driven by Toronto’s Dave Lacey and Steven Johnson.
The No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Stevenson Automotive Pontiac GXP. R team of Andrew Davis and Robin Liddell hope to capture a podium finish, which narrowly eluded them in the last contest at Barber. They are sitting first in number of podium finishes in GT for the season with six, and are tied for fifth in points with 265.
Blackforest Motorsports have two cars entered for this weekend’s competition with a lineup dominated by Canadians. The No. 15 Blackforest Motorsports Ford Mustang GT will be driven by Jean-Francois Dumoulin of Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, and Tom Nastasi of Stamford, Conn. The No. 50 Mustang will seat drivers David Empringham and John Farano - both of Toronto.
RACE SPECS
- This is Round 11 for the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16. The combined Daytona Prototype/GT race is two hours or 200 miles (74 laps), whichever comes first.
- All cars must make a mandatory pit stop prior to the 45-minute mark in the race, and each driver must complete 30 minutes of the race in order to earn points for their respective standings.
- 2007 Montreal race winners were Max Angelelli and Jan Magnussen (Daytona Prototypes), and Andy Lally and RJ Valentine (GT).
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