Luca Mars kicked off the 2024 IMSA racing season with a bang, winning back-to back races in the opening weekend of the VP Racing Challenge series at Daytona International Raceway in the brand new no.59 KohR Motorsports S650 Ford Mustang GT4 on Forgeline one piece forged monoblock GS1R wheels.
Victory didn't come easy for Luca, in the first race on Saturday. He had originally set the third fastest qualifying time, in the no.59 Ford Mustang GT4, but he tipped the scales in the tech shed beneath the minimum weight standard. This infraction bumped him to the back of the field, where he started the race 20th in the GSX class.
But within the first three laps, he had worked his way back into the top ten. And by the second-to-last lap, he was in second place. The final lap of the race was a drag race between Luca's KohR Motorsports Mustang and the no.43 Stephen Cameron Racing BMW M4 GT4 driven by Gregory Liefooghe. Luca barely edged out the BMW at the finish line, winning by just 0.051 seconds.
His win also means that the very first race for the brand new S650 Mustang GT4 platform was a victory. (Hopefully a good omen for the hard-working crew on the Ford Performance Motorsports team and their partners at Multimatic Motorsports.)
Luca's Saturday victory also resulted in a pole position for the start of Sunday's race, which made the path to victory on Sunday much smoother. Luca led Sunday's race flag-to-flag mostly uncontested and won with a 1.322 second margin of victory over the second place no.55 Baby Bull Racing Porsche 718 GT4 RS Clubsport driven by Michael Cooper.
“Two firsts, it’s great for the (VP Racing Challenge) championship,” said Mars. “We’ve got a lot of confidence for the year now and a lot of confidence for next weekend, for the four-hour race.”
Luca and the KohR Motorports Mustang return to action on Friday, January 26, for the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge Series 4-hour BMW M Endurance Challenge at Daytona.
Victory didn't come easy for Luca, in the first race on Saturday. He had originally set the third fastest qualifying time, in the no.59 Ford Mustang GT4, but he tipped the scales in the tech shed beneath the minimum weight standard. This infraction bumped him to the back of the field, where he started the race 20th in the GSX class.
But within the first three laps, he had worked his way back into the top ten. And by the second-to-last lap, he was in second place. The final lap of the race was a drag race between Luca's KohR Motorsports Mustang and the no.43 Stephen Cameron Racing BMW M4 GT4 driven by Gregory Liefooghe. Luca barely edged out the BMW at the finish line, winning by just 0.051 seconds.
His win also means that the very first race for the brand new S650 Mustang GT4 platform was a victory. (Hopefully a good omen for the hard-working crew on the Ford Performance Motorsports team and their partners at Multimatic Motorsports.)
Luca's Saturday victory also resulted in a pole position for the start of Sunday's race, which made the path to victory on Sunday much smoother. Luca led Sunday's race flag-to-flag mostly uncontested and won with a 1.322 second margin of victory over the second place no.55 Baby Bull Racing Porsche 718 GT4 RS Clubsport driven by Michael Cooper.
“Two firsts, it’s great for the (VP Racing Challenge) championship,” said Mars. “We’ve got a lot of confidence for the year now and a lot of confidence for next weekend, for the four-hour race.”
Luca and the KohR Motorports Mustang return to action on Friday, January 26, for the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge Series 4-hour BMW M Endurance Challenge at Daytona.