24 Hours of Daytona : Jim Busby’s Porsche 962 Wins Closest Finish

Jim Busby of Laguna Beach has been trying to win the 24 Hours of Daytona for 15 years. His teams have come close in the past, but never close enough for victory.

Sunday, driving a discontinued Porsche prototype that many consider obsolete, Busby’s team--Bob Wollek of France, Derek Bell of England and John Andretti--won the closest race in the 22-year history of the 24 Hours of Daytona.

“We’ve done everything we can do for 15 years to try and win here,” Busby said. “I think we’ve had more seconds and thirds than anybody in history. We’ve led more laps than anybody, but we finally led the right ones.”

The 962, a model no longer being produced by the German factory, has won four of the last five 24-hour events on Daytona’s 3.56-mile road circuit.

Porsche has won 12 of the last 13 Daytona 24-hour events despite the presence of the state-of-the-art Jaguars and Nissans.

A Jaguar XJR-9 broke Porsche’s string last year, and an XJR-9, co-driven by Price Cobb, John Nielsen of Denmark, Andy Wallace of Britain and Jan Lammers of the Netherlands, battled for the lead through the final 4 hours.

Several times, the British-built car crept within sight of the Porsche. But, each time an exchange of scheduled pit stops pushed the challenger back.

Wollek drove the final 2 hours in the 962, crossing the finish line 1 minute 26.65 seconds ahead of Lammers in the second-place car. The winners completed 621 laps and covered 2,210.76 miles.

The winning average was 92.009 m.p.h.

The finish was the closest in the Daytona 24 Hours, breaking the previous record of 1:49.15 set in 1986 when a 962 driven by Bell, the late Al Holbert and Al Unser Jr. edged the Porsche of A.J. Foyt, Danny Sullivan and Arie Luyendyk of the Netherlands.

Wollek made an 8-second pit stop for a splash of fuel just 4 minutes from the end, making the finish appear somewhat closer than it really was.

The total laps and miles weren’t close to race records because the event was stopped for nearly 4 hours in the early morning because of a dense fog that rolled in off the nearby Atlantic Ocean.

It was the third victory in America’s most prestigious endurance event for both Bell, 47, and Wollek, 45. Andretti, 25, the nephew of Mario Andretti, won the event for the first time.

They will share about $69,500.

The 962 model picked up its 50th IMSA victory since being introduced here in 1984. It was the 17th Porsche victory in the 24-hour event. No other manufacturer has won the race more than once.

The Nissan GTP-ZX of Geoff Brabham of Australia, Luyendyk and Chip Robinson dropped out because of mechanical problems in the 20th hour after leading for most of the previous 11 hours.

After the Nissan fell back, the Jaguar briefly took over. But the Porsche, with Wollek driving, moved into the lead during the 19th hour as the Jaguar experienced overheating problems.

The fog bank rolled in during the early minutes of Sunday morning, forcing IMSA officials to red-flag the field after 10 hours 11 minutes of racing.

The halt came at 1:50 a.m. (EST) with Brabham, the defending Camel GT champion, leading by one lap over the Jaguar.

“I’ve got mixed emotions really,” Brabham said of Nissan’s showing in its first 24-hour event. “I think it’s disappointing to get so close after getting so far. On the other hand, we scared a lot of people.”