Chip Ganassi Racing Pulls Off Rolex 24 Three-Peat

The winning car of Montoya, Pruett, Rojas and Franchitti

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates continued their dominance of the Rolex 24 sports car race winning their third straight overall victory on Sunday at Daytona International Speedway.

The team of Juan Pablo Montoya, Scott Pruett, Memo Rojas and Dario Franchitti in the No. 01 TELMEX Chip Ganassi Racing Lexus Riley won the 46th anniversary of the Rolex 24 by a margin of three laps.

Chip Ganassi Racing’s win is the first time a team has won the overall Rolex 24 in three consecutive years. Peter Gregg and Brumos Racing won three Rolex 24s in a row in 1973, 1975 and 1976 but they were not in consecutive years because the Rolex 24 wasn’t held in 1974 due to the energy crisis.

While it’s a third straight victory for Ganassi, it’s the second straight Rolex 24 win for Montoya and Pruett and the third career overall Rolex 24 win for Pruett.

The 2nd place No. 99 car

Two-time defending NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion and 2006 Daytona 500 champion Jimmie Johnson came close to that elusive first Rolex 24 win again finishing second in the No. 99 Lowe’s/GAINSCO Pontiac Riley with co-drivers Alex Gurney, Jon Fogarty and Jimmy Vasser.

Rounding out the podium was the No. 9 Penske-Taylor Racing Pontiac Riley with drivers Helio Castroneves, Kurt Busch and Ryan Briscoe.

The competition was tight throughout the Rolex 24. There were a record 15 different leaders and 695 laps were completed in the race.

The finish was shaping up to be a special one for the No. 59 Brumos Porsche team. With just under five hours remaining in the race and Joao Barbosa behind the wheel with the overall lead, the rear suspension failed coming off NASCAR Turn 4. The car spun out, made contact with the inside retaining wall and caused significant front end damage to the car.

“Joao had a great restart and going around the banking coming out of (NASCAR Turn) 4, the lower tie rod broke," No. 59 co-driver and five-time Rolex 24 champion Hurley Haywood. “The bolt that holds it on broke and it just sent him right into the wall. There was nothing he could do about it. You want to cry almost."

Patrick Dempsey, star of the hit ABC show Grey’s Anatomy, made his first career start in the Rolex 24 finishing 39th overall co-driving Charles Espenlaub, Joe Foster, Romeo Kapudija and Scott Maxwell.

“We had a lot of bad luck but the team has really rallied to keep the car out there," Dempsey said. “We wanted to finish this race. We had a great time and I can’t wait to do it again."

The pole winner of the Rolex 24 – the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Ford Riley driven by Oswaldo Negri – led the 66-car field to the green flag on Saturday afternoon and finished sixth overall.

In the GT class, the No. 70 SpeedSource Mazda with drivers Sylvain Tremblay, David Haskell, Nick Ham and Raphael Matos finished ninth overall and captured the class victory by a margin of seven laps.

Before the Rolex 24 went green on Saturday afternoon, the crowd was treated to a flyover by three Navy F-5 Tigers based out of Key West and Rolex 24 Grand Marshal Dan Gurney’s starting command, “Drivers, start your engines."

Final Results