{"id":7813,"date":"2025-01-22T09:08:51","date_gmt":"2025-01-22T14:08:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/?p=7813"},"modified":"2025-01-23T09:10:12","modified_gmt":"2025-01-23T14:10:12","slug":"mazda-heritage-collection-2025-season-begins-at-prestigious-rolex-24-at-daytona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/22\/mazda-heritage-collection-2025-season-begins-at-prestigious-rolex-24-at-daytona\/","title":{"rendered":"Mazda Heritage Collection 2025 Season Begins at Prestigious Rolex 24 at Daytona"},"content":{"rendered":"

Collection\u2019s 1991 Mazda RX-7 GTO to take part in new HSR event as part of big Mazda celebrations at Daytona International Speedway<\/em><\/p>\n

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (Jan. 22, 2025)<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 The Mazda Heritage Collection will commence its 2025 race season at Daytona International Speedway, January 23 \u2013 25 as part of the 63rd running of the Rolex 24 At Daytona.<\/p>\n

The return to competition at Daytona for an iconic member of Mazda Motorsports history comes as part of the first-ever Historic Sportscar Racing (HSR) event to be staged during IMSA\u2019s season-opening race weekend.<\/p>\n

The HSR event will see a field of invitation-only entries, with cars being selected by having made history during the first three decades of IMSA racing. Making the cut is the Heritage Collection\u2019s 1991 Mazda RX-7 GTO, which was built by Fabcar and powered by the 13J four-rotor engine. Two cars were built and operated by Mazda legend Jim Downing out of his Atlanta race shop.<\/p>\n

The RX-7 GTO chassis 001 was significant in that it notched win number 100 for the RX-7 and it also secured the 1991 IMSA GTO Championship.\u00a0\u00a0The same chassis even found success in the 1994 24 Hours of Le Mans, where it was run by Japanese team Artnature and finished second in the GTS class.<\/p>\n

For this special event at Daytona, long-time Mazda pilot Tom Long will be behind the wheel.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so exciting to be running the \u201891 GTO RX7 at Daytona, especially with this being the inaugural event HSR runs alongside the Rolex 24 weekend,\u201d Long said. \u201cMazda\u2019s racing heritage runs deep, especially at Daytona. What a fitting opportunity to have this iconic piece of Mazda Motorsport history on track with the season opener for the Mazda MX-5 Cup series. Mazda fans will experience the sight and sound of this this four-rotor, fire-breathing RX-7 monster, all while on the edge of their seats watching MX-5 Cup racing at its finest!\u201d<\/p>\n

The return of the iconic Mazda RX-7 to the high banks of Daytona marks just one component of a very big weekend for Mazda, which will also launch the 35th<\/sup>\u00a0Anniversary edition of the Mazda Miata during the event, as well as staging the opening two races of the 2025 Whelen Mazda MX-5 Cup Championship, which is launching its 20th<\/sup>\u00a0season of racing this year.<\/p>\n

There will be four on-track sessions for HSR during the packed Rolex 24 schedule. A practice session on Thursday, January 23 leads to qualifying and a qualifying race on Friday, January 24. Then, just prior to the start of the 63rd Rolex 24 at Daytona, the HSR field will have its 30-minute race.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Collection\u2019s 1991 Mazda RX-7 GTO to take part in new HSR event as part of big Mazda celebrations at Daytona International Speedway DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (Jan. [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":7814,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,9,75],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-feature","category-mazda-heritage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7813"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7815,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813\/revisions\/7815"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}