Details

Category: Latest News

Created on Monday, 21 January 2013 14:33

UP TO SPEED

Who’s Racing:  

Rolex Series – January 26-27, 2013 Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Series – January 25, 2013

Click here to find out what drivers are saying about The Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona  You can also visit us at youtube.com/continentaltire

Track:

Daytona International Speedway - 3.56-mile, 12-turn stadium road course

Length:

Rolex Series - 24 hour endurance race Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Series – 2.5 hour time limit

Tire Sets:

DP teams will be allowed 32 sets of tires for the 24 Hour race (including slicks and rain tires). The GT class will receive 30 sets. There is no set limit for the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Series (CTSCCS).

 Where Else Does This Compound Race:

DP – the same tire compound used at Daytona will also be used at Indy and Kansas. GT-I – this tire compound is used at Daytona, Indy, Kansas and Watkins Glen. CTSCC – this tire compound will be used at all other tracks this year.

Pit Window:

DP tires will need to be changed at approximately 50 laps during daylight hours and approximately 70 laps during the nighttime hours under cooler conditions. Look for some teams to double stint on tires during the 24-hour event. These are just approximations and does not account for fuel mileage, weather or caution flag laps.

Track Characteristics:

Since it’s repaving in late 2010, Daytona International Speedway has a smooth surface. This produces relatively little wear and because of the low wear, produces relatively high tread temperatures. There are also relatively “high loads” the tires must endure due to the high banked corners and vehicle speeds that are unique to this track.

DID YOU KNOW

It’s crowded - Continental Tire will bring 85 people to the Rolex 24 at Daytona weekend to help process tires. That breaks down to 11 engineers, to work with teams and drivers and to monitor performance, in addition to 74 people working at the Trackside Services Center. During an average race weekend Continental’s staff is approximately 20.

4.9 miles – If Continental Tire lined up the 12,000 tires they will bring to Daytona end to end, the tires would span the distance of approximately 4.9 miles. That’s 24.5 Empire State Buildings; or approximately 1 and 1/3 times around the Daytona International Speedway road course; or the traffic backup on any given day on the 405 in California.

An army of trucks – Continental Tire will load up 17 trailers to transport the 12,000 tires to the Rolex 24 at Daytona. Not all the tires will be used but like the post office, Continental is prepared to deliver rain or shine. The 12,000 tires are divided up into 8,000 slicks and 4,000 rain tires. This is about four times the number of tires for any other race weekend.

Give me 2 minutes – For the 24 Hour race, Continental will have three processing lines set up to help mount and dismount tires throughout the weekend’s activities. From start to finish, the Continental Tire trackside services crew can dismount, mount, and balance a tire in approximately two minutes.

Speeding penalty - At peak demand, the Continental Tire trackside service crew will process 200+ tires per hour. That’s a lot of tires!

IN THEIR WORDS

"For Michael Shank Racing, we could have not had the win or third-place finish without the excellent durability of our Continental Tires. We double stinted these tires 50 percent of the time during the race and they did not fail us once.” – Michael Shank after winning the 2012 Rolex 24 at Daytona.

“A stint for us, which is a full load of fuel, is about 25, 26 laps and during the test we’re seeing we can run those tires, 60-70 laps.” – Scott Pruett following the 2013 Roar test.

HASHTAG IT

The hashtags for this week’s event are: #rolex24

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