SCOTS race ace Dario Franchitti was Grand Marshal at the Rolex 24 at Daytona in Florida last weekend.
Franchitti, from Bathgate, delivered the famous command, “Drivers, start your engines,” as the gruelling 24-hour race got off in some of the most challenging conditions racers had ever been up against.
Rain and cold plagued the race at the famous Florida circuit from start to finish, making it difficult in terms of performance and visibility.
Franchitti, a three-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 and victor in the 2008 Rolex 24, said: “I was honoured to serve as the Grand Marshal at this year’s Rolex 24 and excited about performing the starting orders.
“The Rolex 24 at Daytona has an incredible history and demands so much from the drivers and the teams – it is a true race against time, demanding the utmost durability and performance.”
Franchitti’s only regret, perhaps, was that little brother Marino was not competing. He was part of the Ford Chip Ganassi team last year but was dropped towards the end of the season and not brought back for 2017.
Flying the flag for Scotland was Glasgow-born Ryan Dalziel, who now lives across the pond and drives as part of the Tequile Patrom ESM team. He came fourth with his two co-drivers in the new Prototype class in a Nissan DPi.
The class and overall race was won by Cadillac DPi, which also took second place.
Ford, who returned to endurance racing last year in the GT class, flung all four of their cars – 66, 67, 68 and 69 – at the first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race of the season with some success.
Number 66, driven by Joey Hand, Dirk Muller and Sebastien Bourdais came first in its GT Le Mans class. This was the same car that won the Le Mans GT class last year, so Ford are already doing well.
Ganassi teammates in car 69 finished fifth and car 68 came in seventh. Car 67, the number Franchitti drove with last year, finished many laps behind after an accident in the treacherous night hours.
The Porsche GT team came second in class a 911 RSR making its track debut and showed that, yes, it was very fast.
One other Scot in the running was Edinburgh-born Robin Liddell driving an Audi R8 LMS GT3, who came fourth in the GT Daytona class.