DAYTONA BEACH, Florida (January 30, 2022) - Hardpoint completed the 60th edition of the Rolex 24 At Daytona on Sunday afternoon in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season-opener with an 10th-place finish that didn’t reflect the ultimate on-track pace of the team’s No. 99 GridRival/GNARLY Premium Jerky/de Boulle Diamond & Jewelry Porsche 911 GT3 R.
The final 10th position came with just minutes to spare in the race, moving around a class car that that had recently retired with three minutes to go and grinding to the finish 35 laps behind the GTD leader. Hardpoint had spent time early in the race running in the top five but was forced to the garage early Saturday evening for repairs, setting them back in the field.
Co-drivers Rob Ferriol, Katherine Legge, Stefan Wilson and Nick Boulle began the race in 14th position in the 22-car GT Daytona (GTD) class with Boulle behind the wheel. Over the course of his two-hour stint on Saturday afternoon, Boulle improve to 11th before handing the car over to Wilson for the next leg of the race.
Wilson continued the team’s climb during his double stint, moving comfortably into the top five and reaching as high as second in the standings as a round of pit stops cycled through. That run through the field was Wilson’s debut in the classic 24-hour race, in part through a partnership with Hardpoint and Cusick Motorsports that will see Wilson join the Legge and Ferriol for all Michelin Endurance Cup races in 2022.
The early promise faded quickly just after the six-hour mark, however. Still running competitive lap times, now with Ferriol behind the wheel, the Hardpoint Porsche 911 GT3 R ran to the inside of a Prototype 2 class car that was 10 laps off the pace and had run wide in turn three. The Prototype and Ferriol made side-to-side contact, damaging the splitter, front right damper and bending the steering rack, which forced the team to the garage for a one hour and 15-minute repair.
Despite a tremendous effort by the Hardpoint crew, the unscheduled work left the team 37 laps down and in 17th place when they returned to the track.
The team and drivers went back to work, running lap times matching their earlier top-five pace, led by Legge’s team-best 1:45.895 (121.025 mph). The combined effort throughout the night and into Sunday afternoon saw the team make up six additional spots to land in the top 10 at the finish with 672 laps completed for a total of 2,392.32 miles.
Hardpoint returns to action with season-long drivers Ferriol and Legge, along with Wilson, in the No. 99 GridRival/GNARLY Premium Jerky/de Boulle Porsche 911 GT3 R for another historic endurance race, the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring at Sebring International Raceway, March 16 – 19.