Border Telegraph | Sport | Sixth at Daytona

Friday, 5th December, 2008

Published: Wednesday, 1st February, 2006 10:07

Sixth at Daytona

By Border Telegraph Sport

BORDERS driver Robin Liddell recovered well to ultimately claim sixth in the GT category of Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona in Florida on Sunday.

Liddell, racing a brand new Tafel Racing NEC Porsche 997 in the annual sports car “classic” with German Wolf Henzler, plus Americans Johannes van Overbeek and Graham Rahal, had looked set for a GT class glory.

Having topped the timesheets in all practice sessions last week, co-driver Henzler duly qualified first in class and led the GT field for the first three hours.

But Liddell’s Porsche lost time with lengthy pit-stops, costing the Scotsman any chance of a class podium in the 70-car field.

Robin said: “We lost a total of 20 laps in the pits due to mechanical problems, including seized wheel nuts and studs plus a damaged radiator following contact with another car.

“Although we recovered to take sixth in class it was of little consolation as we’d been fastest in all practice sessions, qualifying, set the fastest race lap and was consistently fastest in our category during the entire 24 hour race.

“But we’d lost over 30 minutes in time with those unscheduled pit-stops which ruled us out of a class top-three.”

Liddell’s next race is in the second round of the Rolex Series at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City on March 4.

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