Technical problems overshadow good result Robert Doornbos in Rolex 24 at Daytona

DAYTONA, 28 JANUARY 2008 – Robert Doornbos did well in his sportscar debut at the Daytona circuit last weekend during the first round of the American Rolex Series. The Dutch driver, sharing his car with Patrick Huisman, Steve Johnson and Richard Lietz, was at the front of the GT field in the early hours of the 24 hour race of Daytona but several technical problems meant the team eventually finished in 38th position overall and 23rd place in the GT class.

In the first and important qualifying session on Thursday a heavy crash of Lietz meant the team was unable to start from a position inside the top 30. The foursome in their Synergy Porsche GT3 Cup finished the qualifying on the last position. In the second qualifying, which took place on Friday, the Synergy Porsche GT3 Cup with Johnson behind the wheel took a great third place, which meant the team would start in the midfield.

Huisman, four time winner of the Porsche Supercup, took the start of the 24-hours race. The number 81 driver got away quite well during the rolling start and was able to get into fourth place shortly after the start. After a safety car period he was able to take the lead in the GT class and returned to the pit lane after two hours for a driver change.

Lietz took over the wheel and was able to maintain the top three position in his stint. After Lietz it was Doornbos who took over the wheel. The Dutchman was confronted with rain in his first stint. While the rest of the field decided to take on wet weather tyres, Doornbos and his team decided to stay out on the track and to keep the slicks on the car. This turned out to be a great decision. The Champcar-driver felt really comfortable on the wet 3.56 miles long circuit and was able to keep his position at the top of the GT standings. He tried to improve his position when he was hit by the Pontiac Riley driven by Marc Goossens. The front suspension of the Porsche was badly hit. The team did some emergency repairs on the problem and after everything was checked the Synergy Racing car returned to the track, albeit over 19 laps behind the leaders. At that point the team knew their chances of getting a decent classification were gone.

Despite the damage to the Porsche, Huisman was setting top three times in the GT class and managed to get back some lost ground and positions. However Huisman was hit from behind not much later and once again the suspension got damaged, making it impossible to continue. Huisman was forced to enter the pit lane where the car was put behind the wall. After one hour of hard work the team had managed to get the Porsche up and running again and the car returned to the track, seventy laps down. In the remaining laps Synergy Racing once again fought itself back through the field and eventually finished in a 23rd place in the GT class.

ROBERT DOORNBOS: “It was a great experience to driver here. It was also the first time to race with a roof over my head. With Patrick Huisman, Lietz and Johnson we had a lot of experience on board to perform well, but a heavy shunt in the first qualifying session caused a lot of problems. The team really worked hard to get the Porsche ready again. In the opening stages of the race everything went well, until we were hit by the Pontiac Riley. The repairs that followed cost us a lot of time and we lost a lot of ground on the rest of the field. In the second half of the 24 hours race we were able to get back some of those lost positions and after a lot of delay we finished in 23rd place. The weather conditions were really changing all the time. During my first stint it started to rain for the first time. With a great tactical move I was the only one out there on slicks and the gamble paid off. Too bad we did not make it onto the podium, because we had a great team of drivers. I hope to take part in this race again next year, because it tastes like more!”

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