Grand American Road Racing officials have revealed that the first Daytona Prototype – the Porsche-powered Fabcar chassis #001 – will be in the spotlight at this weekend's invitation-only Goodwood Festival of Speed.
The car's original drivers, JC France and Hurley Haywood, will drive the #59 Brumos Racing entry on the event's famous 2.5-kilometre hillclimb as they get a rare opportunity to demonstrate the premier Rolex Series class outside of its homeland. The DP cars ushered in a new era in sportscar racing at the 2003 Rolex 24 at
Daytona, and France and Haywood became the first drivers to score an overall victory with a Daytona Prototype at Homestead, before adding a back-to-back triumph - in chassis #001 - at Phoenix International Raceway.
“It is a big honour for Grand-Am to be asked to participate in the Festival of Speed,” said Haywood, a five-time overall winner of the Rolex 24, “Words can not describe what this event is like.
"A wide variety of cars – including current
Formula One cars – run up the hill, and the event draws easily 200,000 people. Everyone you've ever heard of in motorsports is there – from the
F1 champions and team owners, from the manufacturers and the heads of the automobile industry. It's a huge event. Everybody is there."
After being raced for two seasons, scoring 18 top ten finishes, Brumos converted chassis #001 into a show car, so Troy Flis and Spirit of Daytona Racing have been tasked with converting the vehicle back into a race car for this weekend.
“The Spirit of Daytona did a wonderful job,” Haywood said, “I was impressed with the work that Troy and his group did.
“Goodwood gives Grand-Am a wonderful platform to tell Europeans what Grand-Am is all about. The European fans will see the cars are much more attractive in person that what you see in a picture and I think, when they look at what we've got, they will be impressed. JC and I will be shaking hands with a lot of people. This is a very good venue to showcase our product.”
