Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona pole
January 22, 2026
DAYTONA BEATCH – Jack Aitken proved his Cadillac V-Series.R was really fast for one lap during pole qualifying on Thursday for the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona.
Now
comes the biggest challenge: can it survive a twice-around-the clock marathon
on the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway’s road course?
In
what most endurance drivers consider the least most significant task of the
grueling race, Aitken’s prototype was clocked at 136.429 mph, a fraction of a
second quicker than the Acura ARX-06 of Alex Palou (136.281 mph) and another
Cadillac driven by Jordan Taylor (136.240).
One
lap around the circuit that combines a flat, twisting infield road course and
the majority of the high-banked speedway wasn’t much of a challenge, Aiken
said, especially since the record winning distance in 2020 was 833 laps –
2,965.48 miles.
“With
qualifying here, it's a little bit going into the unknown because there's not a
big focus on qualifying,” Aitken said. “Through the practice sessions and the tight
tire allocation and the time on track, frankly, we don't tend to want to spend
it on the qualifying session.”
Retired
driver Hurley Haywood always said the car that spends the least amount of time
on pit road and doesn’t run off the track has the best chance to win. He should
know, because along with Scott Pruett, the driver from St. Augustine has won
the most-prestigious sports car race in America a record five times.
A
full field of 60 cars will practice on Friday before taking the green flag on
Saturday at 1:40 p.m. (NBC/Peacock).
The
race features the top four divisions of the International Motor Sports
Association. In addition to the sleek GT Prototypes, the Le Mans Prototype 2,
GT Daytona and GT Daytona Pro classes will share the track. With a dramatic
variation of speeds, it makes for a greater challenge for the faster prototypes
and the slower GT Daytonas.
The
quickest ORECA LMP2 07 was driven by Jeremy Clarke at 128.222 mph, followed by
the GT Daytona Pro of Alexander Sims at 121.934 and the GT Daytona driven by
Zachjari Robichon at 121.926 mph.
Counting
the Wayne Taylor Racing car, Cadillac will have three of the top seven starting
cars.
“It's
good that we've got more than one Caddy towards the front, and, you know,
they've been stronger all week,” Aitken said. “I think the approach will be the
same. We'll help each other out in the way we’ve passed and try not to make
life too difficult.
“If
there's stuff that we can do to help each other in terms of strategy, then
we'll always look at that as well – just keep the communication open. So, I
doubt there'll be a fixed plan. It's always hard to do that when the race ends.”
NOTES: Aitken’s co-drivers will be Earl Bamber, Frederik Vesti and up-and-coming NASCAR rookie Connor Zilisch, who was traveling from the Charlotte, North Carolina, ahead of a massive snow and ice storm during Thursday’s time trials ... Defending 24-hour race winner and IMSA Weather Tech Series Champion Porsche 962 from Penske Motorsports for Matt Campbell qualified sixth at 136.770 mph. His co-driver for the championship, Mathieu Jaminet, left Penske at the end of the season and signed with Genesis Magma Racing to compete for the World Endurance Championship. He wasn’t racing at Daytona and was replaced by Laurens Vanthoor and Kevin Estre.
