Matteo Cairoli has also wrapped up the 64th edition of the Daytona 24 Hours. The driver from Como made his debut with the #81 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R fielded by DragonSpeed, sharing the car with Henrik Hedman, Giacomo Altoè and Casper Stevenson in the GTD category. For Cairoli, as well as for the DragonSpeed team, this was the first race representing Corvette Racing, making the event even more significant.
The #81 crew delivered a strong qualifying performance, setting a lap time of 1:45.539, which secured seventh place in the GTD class and 12th overall among all GT3 cars, allowing the team to fight for top positions during the early stages of the race.
Unfortunately, the race was compromised by an incident involving Matteo. After an excellent stint in which he showed strong race pace, following a pit stop the Italian driver was hit by a car from another class and ended up in the barriers, suffering heavy damage to the car. The team managed to repair the Corvette, but lost 15 laps in the process.
From that point on, the race effectively turned into a long test session for the team in its first outing with the new car, eventually bringing the Corvette Z06 to the finish after 24 hours. Despite the setbacks, Matteo set the fastest lap of the crew with a 1:46.782, close to qualifying pace. DragonSpeed’s #81 entry finished 16th in the GTD class, completing 643 laps.
Matteo Cairoli
“Definitely not the race I was hoping for, given the incident with another car that caused us to lose many laps early on. We had a lot of damage, but I’m still happy we made it to the chequered flag. I’d like to thank the entire DragonSpeed team; it was also a pleasure working with Giacomo, Casper, Henrik and with Corvette Racing”.
