Rolex 24 At Daytona Winning Team Heavily Penalized By IMSA For Tire Pressure Manipulation

The winning overall team in this year’s Rolex 24 At Daytona was hammered by sanctioning body IMSA on Wednesday for major rules infractions.

Meyer Shank Racing will be able to keep the victory, but was hit was a slew of penalties for manipulating tire pressure data.

According to an IMSA release, the No. 60 Acura at Meyer Shank Racing has incurred a loss of 200 team and driver IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship points, loss of all team and driver IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup points and loss of race prize money. Also, the team was fined $50,000, team owner Mike Shank was placed on probation through June 30, 2023.

Also, team engineer Ryan McCarthy has had his IMSA annual credential revoked along with an indefinite suspension of IMSA membership.

The winning drivers on that team included four-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves, 2019 Indianapolis 500 winner and 2016 NTT IndyCar Series champion Simon Pagenaud and IMSA Sports Car drivers Tom Blomqvist of New Zealand and Colin Braun of the United States.

According to an IMSA release, Meyer Shank Racing was investigated and penalized for the following:

“ATT 3.6.6.E. Failure to adhere to the Operational Requirements is prohibited and may result in the following Minimum Penalties:

First violation: Warning/Reprimand (not guaranteed, depending on timing/severity of violation; for penalties, paragraph vi. below shall apply).

Second violation: Drive-Through.

iii. Third violation: Stop plus ten (10) seconds.

iv. Any violations may be penalized to the full extent listed in Art. 57.

v. A Penalty assessed during or after qualifying may result in qualifying times disallowed.

vi. An un-served Race Penalty or a Penalty assessed after the Race is added to the Car’s Race finishing time and may include a lap count penalty.

Summary – Per Attachment 3.6.6.D, intentional application of software offsets within the pressures being reported by the tire pressure monitoring system and associated Car telemetry system is prohibited and may be subject to penalty.”

The tire pressure data manipulation was discovered by Honda Performance Development (HPD) and reported to IMSA after the official results were released.

No changes will be made to the official race results.

The No. 60 team and drivers retain credit for the race victory, trophy, and race-winner watches. All other teams and drivers will retain the points and prizes commensurate with their finishing positions as shown on the official race results.

There also will be no change to GTP manufacturer points.

Meyer Shank Racing issued the following statement after the penalties were announced:

“We accept the series’ decision and have taken responsibility. We want to apologize to everyone at Acura, HPD, and all of our partners. We have dealt with this issue internally and the team member that was responsible is no longer with the organization. We do not want this error to overshadow the tremendous effort that our team, drivers and all of our partners have put forth to develop this new LMDh car. We consider this matter closed and are fully focused on resetting and coming back for the Twelve Hours of Sebring.”

Honda Performance Development (HPD) President and Technical Director also released a statement regarding the rules infractions and subsequent penalties.

“We are extremely disappointed in the misconduct of the Meyer Shank Racing (MSR) team during the Daytona race,” Salters said in a statement provided by Honda. “We became aware of a problem with data from the #60 MSR car, and after a detailed investigation following the race, we reported our findings to IMSA.

“HPD does not tolerate any misconduct, delinquency, or data manipulation of any kind. We completely support the action of IMSA in this matter. We have put a huge effort over two years with our chassis partners into the ARX-06 to make the best race car we could. To have this put into question is unacceptable.”

The next IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar race is Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, March 15-18 at Sebring International Raceway in Sebring, Florida. The No. 60 car is expected to participate.