DAYTONA BEACH — As the warm-up race for Saturday night's NASCAR Sprint Cup Coke Zero 400, the Brumos Porsche 250 Grand-Am sports car race was warm, and then some.
"Hot, miserable and kind of slippery," said Jon Fogarty, who finished second with teammate Alex Gurney, .270 seconds behind the Altamonte Springs-based SunTrust Racing Ford Dallara shared by drivers Max Angelelli and Brian Frisselle, and owned by former driver Wayne Taylor.
The temperature was 90 degrees when the race started at 2:07 p.m., but the enclosed cockpits of the Daytona Prototype cars took a toll on drivers.
Orlando racer Ryan Dalziel, who finished third in the Riviera Beach-based Orbit Racing BMW Riley with teammate Bill Lester, said it was like "putting a helmet on your head, and having a hair dryer blow into your face for an hour."
The 35-car field — consisting of 19 Daytona Prototypes and 16 of the slower production car-based GT cars — were led to the green flag by the Lexus Riley of drivers Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas, who qualified about one-third of a second quicker than the Pontiac Riley of Fogarty and Gurney. Two of the favorites had problems early: The Brumos Porsche Riley, which won the season-opening 24 Hours of Daytona, had an electrical fire with David Donohue driving. The car returned to the race after repairs but finished 32nd. And the pole-sitting Ganassi Racing car of Pruett and Rojas suffered a flat tire with Rojas driving but rallied back to seventh.
A team car, shared by NASCAR drivers Scott Speed and Kyle Busch, finished 10th.
The biggest surprise was the podium finish of the Orbit Racing car, which missed the last race because of a lack of sponsorship.
"Our car was good from the moment we unloaded it," Lester said. "We feel like we can be much more formidable, a force to be reckoned with. We're really excited about what the future holds."
In the GT class, the fastest qualifier was the Pompano Beach-based SpeedSource Mazda RX-8 of Sylvain Tremblay and Nick Ham, but they ended up finishing second behind the Porsche GT3 of Leh Keen and Dirk Werner. TV star Patrick Dempsey and co-driver Joe Foster, in another Mazda RX-8, started 30th and finished 26th.
Sentinel Automotive Editor Steven Cole Smith can be reached at scsmith@orlandosentinel.com, at 407-420-5699, or through his blog at Enginehead.com.
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