With days to go to the big day, Sunoco IMSA 200 Challenge winner Lewis Plato now prepares himself for the biggest event in his racing career so far.
By winning eight rounds of the 2013 Radical Clubman’s Cup, the 20-year old from Billericay secured the Sunoco-sponsored prize to drive a Chevrolet Camaro in this year’s IMSA 200 race at Daytona on Friday 24th January, the day before the classic 24-hour event. Lewis recently tested the car he will be driving in the ‘Roar before the Rolex 24’, the official pre-event test that’s held over three days at the beginning of January, when he got a real taste of what lies ahead.
As part of the build up towards the race, Lewis spent a few days at last week’s Autosport show, where he was interviewed on the main stage and appeared in a press conference on the Anglo American Oil Company (the official European distributor for Sunoco Race Fuels) stand.
“During the Roar test my excitement for the race increased dramatically, as I was able to appreciate just how big the Daytona weekend really is”, said Lewis. “There’s no doubt it will be like no other event I have competed in before, especially with the quality of the teams and drivers taking part, as well as the massive crowds. The Autosport show just increased the excitement and, during the various interviews, it hit home to me what a great prize I’ve won.”
As previously announced, Mitchum Motorsport will be providing the Chevrolet Camaro that Lewis and his team mate, 2013 TransAm Champion Cameron Lawrence from Windermere in Florida, will drive. The car is currently being prepared in the team’s Virginia Beach workshops and will appear on track for next week’s practice and qualifying sessions sporting a new - but old - livery.
In homage to the hugely successful Camaros that raced in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the 2014 specification car that Lewis drives next weekend will display the familiar blue and yellow Sunoco colour scheme to that seen on the lightweight Z28 model built by Penske in 1967. Over three seasons, this much admired car scored multiple TransAm race victories and went on to claim outright championship glory for Chevrolet in 1968 and 1969 with Mark Donohue at the wheel.
Managing Director of Anglo American Oil Company Anders Hildebrand is delighted that Mitchum Motorsport will be providing their Camaro to the Sunoco IMSA 200 Challenge Champion for the third year running:
“Mitchum Motorsport provide us with a perfect introduction programme to get our Sunoco IMSA 200 Challenge winners up to speed. Last year's winner Lawrence Davey ran as high as sixth before a race incident hampered his result, which proves that the combination of the team and the Camaro has the potential to achieve a top-10 result. Lewis has already shown he can cut it on the famous 31-degree banked oval circuit and, as we are also bringing the iconic Sunoco sponsored Camaro livery from the sixties back to life, I am very excited about this year’s race."
Whilst the competition history that surrounds the original Sunoco Camaros is the stuff of legends, Lewis is keeping his ambitions for the forthcoming Daytona race entirely realistic:
“My aims for next weekend are clear. As the true pace of my driving in the Camaro is still to be established, I’m not going to say too much and then add pressure to myself for this amazing experience. Therefore, I am going to drive to the best of my ability and have a strong race. If we finish in the top-ten I will be ecstatic; but just finishing the race at all will be a huge achievement and something I will take with me for the rest of my racing career.”
Lewis will be competing in the 200-mile long race that encompasses the first round of the new format IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge. The action at the infamous 3.56-mile banked track gets underway at 1.45pm EST (9.45pm GMT) on Friday 24th January.