One of the new team names on the grid for last month’s season opening 24 Hours of Daytona was Stow Motorsports. The team based out of Stow, Ohio which also is the reason for the organization’s name, originally has its roots in IndyCar racing.
But with the 2023 season, the team registered one entry, the No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8 for the VSCA SportsCar Championship, marking the beginning of a new chapter in the team’s history since its formation in 2020.
“Yeah, our team of four (Caleb Benci, Logan Spath, Matt Huston, Gavin Sanders), we’ve been racing together since early 2020 and we’ve been close friends ever since 2021. This is really kind of the first conjoined team operation in endurance racing.”, Gavin Sanders explained.
“Normally we primarily run IndyCars and so forth. So this was a really good time to spend a lot more time as friends and get into a whole different style of racing.”
Perhaps because of nerves or lack of experience, the No. 24 car of the team qualified towards the back of the LMDh class grid in tenth with Sanders taking on qualifying and starting driver duties.
But once the green flag waved, the team showed that it not only belongs in the series, but that it is one of the challengers to be reckoned with for the win.
The first stint was difficult, but by the end of the second stint the team had taken the lead, also in part thanks to a crash ahead involving race leaders and second-place runners, the No. 79 Champion Motorsports car and the No. 8 machine of Grizzly Motorsports.
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| Lap 46: Race leaders, the No. 79 Champion Motorsports BMW M Hybrid V8 and second-place runners No. 8 Grizzly Motorsports are involved in a big crash in turn four, giving the lead to the Stow Motorsports No. 24 machine and Gavin Sanders - © 2023 VSCAracing.com / Benjamin Fischer |
It turned out this was no fluke and the No. 24 team racked up a race-high total of 318 laps in the lead, equal to eventual race winners at Mayer Simspeed Performance and their No. 3 LMDh car.
Once all four drivers had run their first laps in the race, the team focused on just staying on the lead lap and free of damage.
Once Sunday morning arrived, the LMDh class had turned into a two-car battle between the No. 24 Stow Motorsports BMW and the No. 3 BMW of Mayer Simspeed Performance, with the lead changing hands multiple times.
“There were only two cars left on the lead lap at that time. We were the ones who stuck it out and kept up with the No. 3 towards the end, until it all went wrong for us unfortunately.”, Sanders added.
Ready to launch the final push and attack on the lead for the final hours of the race, a flurry of technical issues hit the car.
Sanders was slowed by a pedal potentiometer issue, while Caleb Benci experienced massive electrical issues during one of his stints.
“Yeah, that was unfortunate. Unfortunately the potentiometer got stuck on the throttle pedal and I locked up into the western horse shoe and hit the wall, which was a very unflattering end. But I guess it was just a kind of chaos-ridden race for us in the end.”, said Sanders.
Jumping back into the car after repairs, the team faced the reality that despite all best efforts, the race win would no longer be achievable, but kept pushing to secure the second-place finish in the end, crossing the line seven laps down from the race winners, in a race that saw exceptionally high levels of attrition in the LMDh class.
By finishing second at Daytona, the No. 24 BMW LMDh team of Stow Motorsports now sits third in the championship standings.
Gavin Sanders: “Compared to previous experiences for us as a team, this was a big improvement and everybody really did well. Obviously we’d have loved to win and battle for it to the last couple of minutes, but it was a really good start and hopefully it continues that way.”
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