Conquest Endurance completes historic test at Daytona

Conquest Endurance made history this week at the Daytona International Speedway when the team rolled out their Morgan-Nissan P2 machine and lapped around the infield road course of the 3.56-mile high-banked superspeedway with driver Martin Plowman behind the wheel. The American Le Mans Series team shared the track with 20 cars from the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series representing the early stages of what will be a unified sports cars series in 2014.

Plowman completed more than 50 laps around the Daytona track in what served as a test for Continental’s Daytona Prototype tires, which were mounted for the first time ever in the team’s P2 car. The series officials also took advantage of the test to go through a checklist of verifications, and validation of simulation information as the process of merging the two sport-car series and their various classes takes place.

It was the first time that the team hit the track since the season ending Petit Le Mans race at Road Atlanta, where the Conquest squad had a dominating run in what looked to be like their third victory of the year until the last few minutes of the 1000-mile race when a flat tire dashed their hopes for capturing the checkered flag.

Conquest Endurance had an impressive rookie 2012 season in the American Le Mans series presented by Tequila Patron. After quickly adapting to the intricacies of sports car racing, Conquest captured three pole positions (Mosport, Road America, VIR) and two wins (Mosport, Road America) throughout the year and was a contender for the P2 title up until the last couple of hours of the last race of the season.

Martin Plowman Driver #37 Conquest Endurance / Morgan / Nissan “That was a great experience, running our P2 car through those high-banks was definitely a different feel to what we are used to. We had a specific plan to make sure we adapted the setup of the car to the Continental tires, we ended up very happy with the result. The tires performed very well, we could make changes and have a good reading on the balance of the car and we are confident that we left the track with a good understanding on how to move forward.”

Eric Bachelart Team Principal “We are very happy with the test, the tires performed beautifully. They were very consistent and we could do a lot of changes to the chassis. Sharing the track with the GRAND-AM cars was a very positive glimpse into the future, we are all working together now to make sure that the unified series will be a big success both for the teams and the fans.”

Conquest Endurance