24h Le Mans
Though it would be a lengthy endeavor to name all the drivers present on the starting grid at the 65th edition of the 12 Hours of Sebring who have participated or will participate in the 24 Hours of Le Mans this year - since they're are more than 50 of them - there are three previous overall winners and several class winners.
Only three previous 24 Hours of Le Mans overall winners will be at the start in Florida, but they have five victories between them. Marcel Fässler, who will share the wheel of the #4 Corvette C7.R with Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner - who have won five and two class trophies at Le Mans, respectively - won three times with Audi and his buddies André Lotterer (now an official Porsche driver in LM P1) and Benoît Tréluyer.
The second previous 24 Hours of Le Mans overall winner at the start this afternoon is also a member of the Corvette Racing team: Mike Rockenfeller, winner with Audi as well at Le Mans, but in 2010, joined by Jan Magnussen and Antonio Garcia who have reached the top step on a class podium at the 24 Hours four and three times, respectively.
Though the first two have no chance for the overall win at the 12 Hours of Sebring since they are racing in GT, the third, Neel Jani does. The 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans winner with Porsche (along with Romain Dumas and Marc Lieb) clinched the pole in Florida with Rebellion Racing's Oreca. He also crushed the circuit record for a prototype in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship by nearly three seconds with a time of 1:48:178, even though that's still far from the record (in-race) held by Sébastien Bourdais with the Peugeot 908 HDi FAP in 1:43:274 in 2009.
Bourdais will not be able to beat his own record at the Sebring International Raceway as he will share with Joey Hand and Dirk Müller the #66 Ford GT in GTLM (the equivalent of the LM GTE Pro class in the U.S.). It is the same car with which the three drivers won in the LM GTE Pro class last year at Le Mans, 50 years to the day after the first of the American marque's four consecutive wins at the 24 Hours with the Ford GT40.
The GTLM class boasts the largest number of previous 24 Hours of Le Mans class winners, not surprising since they're factory drivers. In addition to Corvette Racing and Ford Chip Ganassi Racing drivers, official Porsche and Ferrari drivers will be at the start, such as Richard Lietz (#911 Porsche), three wins at Le Mans, Toni Vilander and Giancarlo Fisichella (#62 Ferrari), two wins together at Le Mans in 2012 and 2014.
In the GTD class are, for example, Bill Sweedler and Townsend Bell (#23 Audi R8 LMS), winners in 2016 in LM GTE Am at Le Mans with Scuderia Corsa, and Jörg Bergmeister (#73 Porsche 911), winner in 2004.
All of these drivers will be at the start of the 65th edition of the 12 Hours of Sebring this afternoon at 2:40 p.m. in the U.K. (10:40 a.m. local time). Live-stream the race at IMSA-TV for non-North American residents and on the Fox Sports cable channel for residents.
Photo (Copyright - Richard Dole/IMSA): Mike Rockenfeller and Marcel Fässler, both previous 24 Hours of Le Mans winners, raced with Corvette Racing at the Rolex 24 at Daytona (under the watchful eye of Doug Fehan, the head of Chevrolet Corvette's sporting program) and will do so at the 12 Hours of Sebring.
