Jeannette on “Very Special” 1983 Porsche Tribute Livery

Photo: Juergen Tap/Porsche

Gunnar Jeannette said it’s “very special” to be able to run a tribute livery to the 1983 Rolex 24-winning Porsche 935 on his and PJ Hyett’s AO Racing team’s Porsche 911 GT3 R for next weekend’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season opener.

Jeannette, Hyett and Multimatic-contracted drivers Seb Priaulx and Harry Tincknell will co-drive the debuting GTD class entry, which will carry the the same colors and graphics from the iconic Swap Shop Porsche that took overall victory at Daytona 30 years ago in the hands of Preston Henn, AJ Foyt, Bob Wollek and Claude Ballot-Lena.

The car, built by Porsche legend Alwin Springer, was run by Gunnar’s father, Kevin, who served as crew chief on the program.

“PJ was able to get the ’83 winner from the Henn family,” Gunnar told Sportscar365.

“Obviously I’ve been around it forever and we were sort of talking about Daytona stuff and we were like, ‘It is the anniversary so if we wanted to do it, this would be the year.’

“I’m absolutely ecstatic with how the car looks. The reception that we’ve gotten from everybody… It’s obviously very special for me to do a tribute to my father and to Alwin Springer, who built the original car and Preston and AJ and Bob.

“I feel like a lot of people are into sports car racing now but maybe don’t know history-wise all of the stuff that’s come before it.

“The only thing I’d say is that I really encourage people to learn about that ’83 win.

“The story of AJ hopping in the car mid-race, how unhappy Bob was, and yet in victory lane they’re basically best friends and they go on to race several other times after that is a really, really cool story.”

Jeannette said he feels confident about the team’s debut race despite having only had a two-day test with the new Type-992 Porsche under its belts prior to this weekend’s Roar Before the Rolex 24.

The upstart squad, based in St. Charles, Ill., features several former CORE autosport factory Porsche staff on board including crew chief Adam Wareing and race engineer Charles Hamm.

“I couldn’t be more excited,” Jeannette said. “I really feel we’ve put together a great crew of experienced people, it’s just all getting to work together.

“A lot of the guys have done that on various programs.

“From a team perspective, I’m pretty comfortable where we are.

“Coming into a 24-hour race with Porsche, you can never consider yourself an underdog. But obviously it’s a new generation car this year, everybody’s struggling from suppliers with parts and stuff.

“BoP wise, what we’ve received thus far seems a little harsh. But until we get out on track, it’s hard to know what that means.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John