Gearbox issues bring Hoggard’s impressive Daytona Debut to premature halt

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Johnathan Hoggard showed exactly why he is the 2020 Sunoco Whelen Challenge winner, delivering a sterling performance on his Daytona debut despite having an injured knee.

The 19-year-old came into the weekend on the back foot having had to switch teams, moving to Precision Performance’s Lamborghini Huracan GT3, after Rick Ware Racing had to withdraw their Multimatic Riley LMP2 chassis from the 58th running of the world famous 24-hour race.

Getting his first experience of driving the Italian GT car during Thursday’s Free Practice session, Johnathan demonstrated why he won the Aston Martin Autosport BRDC Award, with his ability to rapidly adapt to any racing car evident from how quickly he got comfortable, not only with a new car, but also a new team and team-mates.

With regular driver Brandon Gdovic qualifying the car in 14th place in the GTD class he was back behind the wheel as the flag fell at 1:40pm local time to start the historic twice around the clock race. Before the hour was out Johnathan was behind the wheel for a double stint and quickly set fast times, moving up to P6 when he handed the car over to bronze driver Mark Kvamme. His pace all the more impressive after sustaining a knee injury during driver change practice on Friday afternoon, requiring him to right foot brake.

Sadly, the car would sustain heavy damage when Eric Lux was hit from behind whilst entering the pits by the 98 Aston Martin during the sixth hour of running. With a large part of the Aston lodged in the Lamborghini’s rear suspension, a lengthy pit stop was required to repair the damage.

The car rejoined four laps down with the right hand side of the rear diffuser missing as a result of the incident, severely affecting the car’s aerodynamics. With Johnathan back behind the wheel for a second stint at 9pm, he once again impressed as he set a time of 1:46.660 to record the team’s fastest lap of the race.

Excellent strategy and some solid drives from Brandon, Eric, Mark and Johnathan allowed the team to regain a lap, but the car ground to a halt after 608 laps as Johnathan was in the closing stages of his third double stint. After investigating the problem in the garage, the team quickly diagnosed the gearbox was the cause and had no choice but to retire the car with four hours of the race left to run.

Johnathan Hoggard

“I was very excited to come to the ROAR, unfortunately it didn’t really go to plan and there was a last-minute switch to the PPM Lamborghini for the race. We started off well, but I had a knee injury which put another spanner in the works, which meant we had to figure out a new way to do driver changes and then I also had to learn to right foot brake.

Overall, it’s not the result the team wanted or deserved. It has been a great experience, racing during the night-time is mega, I’ve really enjoyed it. I need to say a massive thank you to Whelen and Anglo American Oil Company for giving me this opportunity, it has been great.”

Anders Hildebrand, Managing Director – Anglo American Oil Company

“At the ROAR we were in the LMP2 car but the pro driver had an accident, and the bronze driver left, so we tried to find a quick bronze driver with some money but we couldn’t, so we then went to PPM who ran Linus Lundqvist last year and they had a seat available for Johnathan. Of course, they knew the performance of our winners, so they said ‘yeah, we want him!’

“We were running tenth, unfortunately we lost a number of laps due to the shunt with the Aston Martin. That said, the lap times Johnathan was able to put in, despite all this damage, was just fantastic.  He’s a very special driver and it’s just amazing to be involved at such an early stage with these guys.”

Dalgleish Delights on Daytona Debut

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2020 Sunoco 240 Challenge winner Robbie Dalgleish showed his class in the four-hour BMW Endurance Challenge At Daytona race on Friday, making up a staggering 14 places off the line to put the Fast Track BMW in with a chance of the podium.

With the BMW M4 GT4 suffering electrical issues during final practice on Thursday that persisted for qualifying, Robbie was not able to set a time during the 15-minute session. This meant the blue and white Sunoco branded car had to start at the back of the GS pack, in 31st on the grid.

With no pressure, and under instruction to enjoy the moment, Robbie put in a superb performance to move forward from the moment the flag fell. Quickly finding his rhythm he scythed his way through the field, moving up 14 places to hand the car over to BMW Junior driver Beitske Visser for her double stint. Unfortunately, soon after the car picked up a puncture due to debris on the circuit. The resulting pit stop dropped them down the order, further compounded by a second puncture.

With fellow Scot Stevan McAleer completing the race with a double stint the team were left wondering what could have been, finishing three laps down in 22nd place.

Robbie Dalgleigh

“It wasn’t to be but I’m happy with my stint and it has been an amazing experience. The full course yellow came out and we pitted and refuelled but didn’t change tyres so we were sitting in P12 and ready to go. We were in the perfect position because we were bang on for three stops but then two laps later, we got a puncture. With the puncture we had problems with air pressure, so we lost a couple of laps and then half an hour later we got another puncture.

“I’ve been living in a different world since the beginning of January. I don’t really want it to end but who knows, this could be the start of something. The team were amazing, we win together, we lose together, and my team-mates have been great as well.

I would never be here If it wasn’t for this programme so thanks to Sunoco for continually running the Challenge and allowing drivers like me to have this opportunity.

Anders Hildebrand, Managing Director – Anglo American Oil Company

“It was stunning. With the issues in qualifying and the sensor failing, Robbie had to start second from last and it’s always nervous. There’s always a lot of action into the first corner and the concertina effect but there were no crashes and Robbie was able to pick them off one-by-one.

“Bringing the car from 31st to 17th, he’s a class driver. Coming from Mini Cooper with 130bhp into a GT4 car with four times the power, on 31-degree banking, at 170 miles per hour – I’m impressed.”