Ferrari Racing Days: Daytona 2022

What a beautiful weekend in Daytona to set the annual Ferrari Racing days extravaganza.

The 2022 season opener in COTA already showed a record presence of Ferrari Challenge drivers. It also didn’t disappoint at the Daytona International Speedway either.

Ferrari’s Racing Ground

Daytona is host for many major events for Ferrari Competizioni, including Finali Mondiali, GT and the notable 24-hour event. The prancing horse made the Florida-based track the major host of all the manufacturer programs. The schedule included both private testing and practice session for the Ferrari Challenge competitors.  It concluded on Sunday with Coppa Shell and Trofeo Pirelli races.

Other activities included highlights of the weekend with Club Challenge, XX program cars and Competizioni GT. The last show is the F1 show with the single-seater car taking over the action. After followed pre-race festivities and open paddock for all public access to see the cars and take pictures on the Daytona’s pit lane. Moreover, the next Ferrari Challenge event will be in Watkins Glen International, from May 18th to May 22nd.

Races Commentary (From Ferrari Racing Days Action Concludes at Daytona)

Trofeo Pirelli

After a disaster of a race on Saturday, Manny Franco (Ferrari of Lake Forest) bounced back and trounced the field en route to his second win of the 2022 season on Sunday, besting Jeremy Clarke (Ferrari of Beverly Hills) and Matt Kurzejewski (Ferrari of Westlake) who rounded out the podium in second and third.

After claiming the pole position, Franco jumped to the lead, but was never quite able to build a gap as the top four cars remained in relatively close contention through the first half of the thirty-minute contest. But, at that point the complexation of the race changed as a driver had an incident at the tricky turn one, bringing out the full-course yellow.

After a lengthy slow period while crews took care of the accident, Franco jumped back into the lead on the restart though Clarke kept the pressure on throughout.  By the end of the contest, Clarke was just eight-tenths of a second behind while Kurzejewski was a further four seconds back.

In the AM category, Dave Musial Jr. (Ferrari of Lake Forest) took his first win in the Trofeo Pirelli AM category while he was chased to the checkered flag by championship leader Alfred Caiola (Ferrari of Long Island).  The podium was completed by Benoit Bergeron (Ferrari of Quebec) thought it was a hard-fought affair as he and Todd Coleman (Ferrari of Denver) traded places several times through the race.

Coppa Shell

Brian Kaminskey (Ferrari of Long Island) took his second pole position and converted that into a race win on Sunday, his second of the season. It was an incredible race as Kaminskey locked in a race-long fight with Michael Petramalo (Ferrari of Seattle) and as the laps clicked down, Petramalo’s enduring pressure began to have an affect on Kaminskey.

Out of the final few corners, Petramalo ran a great run and surged closer as they approached the line, but ultimately came up just one tenth of a second short of beating Kaminskey.  Justin Rothberg (Ferrari of Palm Beach) rounded out the podium in third, three seconds adrift of the leaders.

The race also featured a solitary safety car period after another incident in turn one took time to clear. This led to a bottleneck at the massive 33-car field up before the restart with about 10 minutes remaining. In the Coppa Shell Am category Anthony Davis (Continental Autosports) took his first win of the season. He earned successive podiums during the previous round in Austin. Davis also established himself as the championship leader in the category by a single point.

David Schmitt (Ferrari of Palm Beach) followed behind Davis, making his first podium appearance in Ferrari Challenge competition. In addition, Dan Cornish (Ferrari of Austin) enjoyed an excellent, double-podium weekend at Daytona.

Daytona Ferrari Racing Days Gallery