The announcement of the merger between GRAND-AM and ALMS has sparked off a lot of reactions, in Northern America and in Europe as well. It seemed to be interesting to have the opinion pf a sportscar racing specialist, who has the best record as an endurance-racing driver, Hurley Haywood. The American driver has claimed five overall wins in the 24 Hours at Daytona (1973, 1975, 1977, 1979 and 1991), three overall wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans (1977, 1983 and 1994) and two overall wins in the 12 Hours of Sebring 1973 and 1981), among other titles, being the first driver ever to have won at Daytona and Le Mans in the same year. He has finished in third place overall no later than in 2009 in the Rolex 24 at Daytona behind the wheel of a Brumos Racing Porsche Riley and was third in the GT category at Daytona too earlier this year alongside Leh Keen and Andrew Davis -the 2011 Rolex Series GT champions- and Marc Lieb, aboard a Brumos Racing Porsche GT3. 

Hurley Haywood’s career is closely linked to Brumos Racing. He is Brumos Porsche and Brumos Racing Vice-President. He is has been kind enough to give us a statement about this merge :      

Hurley Haywood : “It was certainly an exciting week for sports car racing with the surprise announcement of the merger of the GRAND-AM Rolex Series and American Le Mans Series. There is a lot of work ahead in 2013 for both series and all of the teams involved.  Right now there are many unanswered questions, but we have over a year to sort it all out. I am confident that joining forces will do a lot to further sports car racing as we combine the best of both worlds to create one series that will be stronger than either could be alone.

 Brumos has been racing Porsches for six decades now and has seen many changes through the years. We were one of the first teams on board when GRAND-AM developed the Daytona Prototype and last year our move back to GT competition ended in a championship. We will look forward to seeing how the new series will evolve, but for now it is business as usual as we focus on 2012 and prepare for our season finale.”

We do thank Hurley Haywood for his kindness.

Claude Foubert