Following qualifying for the 2026 Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona, the technical inspectors imposed two severe penalties that significantly altered the starting grid.
The No. 31 Action Express Cadillac (Aitken/Bamber/Vesti/Zilisch), which had just celebrated pole position with Jack Aitken behind the wheel, was stripped of pole position and moved to the back of the GTP field. During the technical inspection, the stewards found that the rear skid block had been ground down too much.
It is unusual for such wear to occur after just a short qualifying session, suggesting that the Cadillac was set up extremely low and aggressively. As a result, the No. 93 Meyer Shank Racing Acura (van der Zande/Yelloly/Palou/Ohta) inherits pole position for the endurance racing classic. They will be joined on the front row by The No. 40 Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac (J. Taylor/Deletraz/Herta).
BMW top team also penalized
It wasn't just in the top class that there were changes. In GTD Pro, the No. 1 Paul Miller BMW (Verhagen/de Phillippi/Hesse/Harper) was also relegated to the back of the class.
The reason here was a technical violation relating to the chassis: the camber did not comply with the specified range in the regulations. The team, which was supposed to start from P2 in the class, now has to work its way up from the back of the GTD Pro field.
These penalties move numerous competitors up the grid. In GTP, the WTR Cadillac #40 (J. Taylor/Deletraz/Herta) moves up to the front row, with the best Porsche 963 now starting from third place. The #59 RLL McLaren (Esterson/N. Johnson/Vips/MacDonald) will now start from the front row in GTP Pro on its debut in the IMSA SportsCar Championship.
But being a 24-hour event, these teams will have plenty of time to make up lost ground, even if they start the race with some hurt pride. The No. 31 team didn't seemed too rattled either, as they immediately went out in evening practice on Thursday and once again set the fastest laptime.
