Five from Fifty

This year marks the 50th Anniversary of the race that began as the Daytona Continental in 1962 and evolved into today’s Rolex 24 at Daytona, but not all of those races were run for a full 24 hours. The first two runnings had a three-hour duration, while the next two ran to 2000 kilometers, and in 1972, responding to a global fuel crisis, the specified length was six hours. Further, because no race was run in 1974—again due to energy worries—this year’s 50th Anniversary event will also be its 50th running.

As noted, of those 50 runnings 44 have gone the full two spins around the clock, with eight of them decided by a margin of victory less than one lap, and 17 recording winning margins of 10 laps or more. The closest finish ever was registered just three years ago, when David Donohue, Darren Law, Buddy Rice and Antonio Garcia won the 2009 Rolex, edging Juan Pablo Montoya, Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas by a slim 0.167 seconds, while the largest victory margin came in 1979 when the Interscope Porsche 935 driven by Hurley Haywood, Danny Ongais and Ted Field left their closest remaining pursuers 49 laps behind.