The world debut of the Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT race car came at the 2016 Rolex 24 At Daytona, but it was a race Ford would rather forget, as both cars suffered from mechanical issues that ruined their chances for a solid finish.

Of course, the team made up for that with a class win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans on the 50th anniversary of the race victory of the original Ford GT, and put together a solid 2016 season in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

For the 2017 Rolex 24 At Daytona, Ford and Ganassi are serious about winning. How serious? Not only did they bring the two U.S.-based cars – the Le Mans-winning No. 66, and the team car, No. 67 – they brought the two Europe-based Ford GTs, No. 68 and No. 69.

And it appears they are ready for the challenge, qualifying first, second, third and sixth in the 11-car field Thursday afternoon.

On the pole was the No. 66 driven by Joey Hand, one of the drivers who won at Le Mans. “We feel like we’re more prepared this year,” he said. And how does he feel about the fact that his central competition may be his three teammates? “Well,” he said, “you just want to be the fastest bullet in the gun!” Hand’s best lap was 1:43.473 seconds, just ahead of Richard Westbrook’s 1:43.704 in the No. 67. Third was Olivier Pla in the No. 68, whose best lap was 1:43.987. Pla’s best lap was on the fourth tour around the circuit, which was lucky, as he later spun off the track and sat in the grass for most of the session.

Fourth was the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE, with a lap of 1:44.121 by Toni Vilander. He said he well realizes the challenge the Ford contingent presents, but says, “We have a strong lineup of drivers, and we’re looking forward to the race. We won Petit Le Mans last year,” referring to the WeatherTech Championship 10-hour season finale at Road Atlanta, “And everything we have is the same or better. We’re the lonely riders – the only Ferrari in the class.”

The GT Le Mans class is mechanically much the same as it was in 2016, with one major exception. The No. 911 and No. 912 Porsche 911 RSRs run by the Porsche GT Team are all-new, with the most significant change being a shift from the traditional 911 rear-engine configuration to more of a mid-engine layout.

The rest of the cars – the Ford GT, Chevrolet Corvette C7.R, BMW M6 GTLM and the Ferrari 488 GTE are expected to benefit from having at least a year of competition behind them.

The Porsches were quick, but not quick enough: Patrick Pilet was fifth in the No. 911 car, and Kevin Estre was eighth in class in the No. 912.

In GT Daytona, it was Ferrari, Ferrari and Aston Martin. The front row in the class will be the No. 51 Spirit of Race Ferrari 488 GT3, courtesy of Alessandro Pier Guidi, whose best lap was 1:47.099. “Ferrari and the team did a great job for me,” Pier Guidi. “I’m here for them.” He was not able to make pre-season testing at Daytona, so the pole win was impressive.

Close behind – very close, in fact – was the No. 63 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 GT3 driven by Alessandro Balzan who, with co-driver Christina Nielsen, won the 2016 WeatherTech Championship season GTD title. The veteran Balzan’s best lap was 1:47.117, which he set in a Hail-Mary last lap that nearly earned him the top spot. “Scuderia Corsa gave me a really good car for qualifying, Balzan said. “There’s a good energy here for the team.”

Third was the No. 98 Aston Martin Racing Vantage, driven by Marco Sorensen to a lap of 1:47.734. His Aston Martin was followed by the No. 59 Porsche 911 GT3 R driven by Matteo Cairoli, the No. 11 Lamborghini Huracán of Christian Engelhart, and the No. 29 Audi R8 LMS GT3 piloted by Connor De Phillippi.

The new Michael Shank Racing Acura NSXs were seventh and ninth. The similarly new 3GT Racing Lexus RCFGT3s were 13th and 20th. And the three Mercedes AMG GT3s – while not an all-new car, are new to the GT Daytona class – were 18th, 19th and 24th in the field of 27 entries.

NGT Motorsport is heading to the 55^th Rolex 24 At Daytona supporting two teams that have made the long trip from Europe. NGT last competed at Daytona in 2014, in the GT Daytona (GTD) class, with the then-new Porsche GT America.

Ebimotors, which has competed in the Rolex 24 before, returns from more than a 10 year absence to race for a win. The team will enter a Lamborghini Huracán GT3 in the GTD class. Ebimotors is a regular competitor in the Italian GT Open, with ex-factory driver Fabio Babini and Enrico Busnelli. They are set to be joined at Daytona by sports car veteran Emmanuel Collard and Francois Perrodo.

Porsche stalwart and endurance veterans Manthey Racing will enter a Porsche GT3 R in the GTD class. Its long and successful record of 24-hour race accomplishments brings the team back to Daytona with a revised lineup from earlier testing. 2016 Porsche Supercup champion Sven Muller and vice-champion Matteo Cairoli will spearhead the lineup. The duo battled back and forth for the 2016 Porsche Supercup championship. Also in the car are Steve Smith, Harald Proczyk and Reinhold Renger.

After its efforts at Daytona, NGT Motorsport will return to the IMSA Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama series, which opens March 15-17at Sebring International Raceway during the 12 Hours of Sebring. The team has run in the series since its inception, winning four championships along the way.

In an endurance race, the fastest car doesn’t always win, which proved true during Friday’s BMW Endurance Challenge At Daytona, where the clear early favorites were the new Ford Mustangs. In qualifying, Dean Martin put the No. 59 on the pole with a best lap around the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway of 1 minute, 55.754 seconds.

And in the race itself, veteran Ford racer Scott Maxwell held the fastest lap in the No. 15 Mustang at 1:55.572. But after a grueling four hours, the No. 15 Multimatic Mustang ended up fifth, and the No. 59 KohR Motorsports Mustang finished a distant 28th after suffering a powertrain failure early on.

In the end, Porsche seized the day, taking the top four spots in the Grand Sport class in the IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge. The winner was the No. 12 Bodymotion Porsche Cayman GT4 of Trent Hindman and Cameron Cassels, with Hindman behind the wheel at the end as he nipped the No. 33 CJ Wilson Racing Porsche of Marc Miller, who co-drove with Till Bechtolsheimer, by a narrow 0.577 seconds.

Third was the No. 35 Porsche – the other CJ Wilson car, owned by the Major League Baseball player – driven by Russell Ward and Damien Faulkner. Fourth was yet another Porsche Cayman GT4, this one the No. 28 RS1 entry driven by Dillon Machavern and Dylan Murcott.

Cassels, who started the No. 12 Porsche before Hindman took over, has never raced at the track. “To come here and win Daytona – how crazy is that?” he asked.

Hindman has raced here three times with no wins – “I guess the third time’s the charm,” he said. The car had multiple problems in the Roar Before the Rolex 24 test earlier this month, and it was a thrash to prepare it for the race.

“Hard work by the Bodymotion guys is what got us here,” Hindman said, who is doing double duty this weekend as one of five drivers in the No. 26 BAR1 Motorsports Prototype Challenge car for the Rolex 24 At Daytona.

In the Street Tuner class, it was a record first win for the MINI JCW team, which has come close in its Mini Coopers, but finally took the checkered at Daytona.

The win came as a bit of a surprise to the drivers of the No. 73 entry, Derek Jones and Mat Pombo. Anyone who has seen a Mini Cooper, compared to the three Porsche Caymans that finished second through fourth, knows that the boxy Mini isn’t the most aerodynamic choice. “It isn’t the most ‘aero’ car for Daytona, so this is a little unexpected,” said Jones.

As for Pombo, a member of a well-regarded racing family, “I’ve always had horrendous luck at Daytona,” he said. “This is a really big win for our group. To finally get one, and get it at Daytona, is fantastic.”

Pombo crossed the finish line 1.568 seconds ahead of the No. 56 Murillo Racing Porsche Cayman of Eric Foss and Jeff Mosing. In third was the No. 17 RS1 Cayman of defending class champions Spencer Pumpelly and Nick Galante. Fourth was the team RS1 Cayman, the No. 18 driven by Aurora Straus, Nick Longhi and Connor Bloum, who had qualified the car on pole.

The most serious incident of the race occurred when Nico Rondet’s No. 77 McLaren GT4 began leaking fluid on the track, causing multiple cars to spin out as Rondet limped to a pull-off spot. The yellow flag flew for a lengthy caution as the track crew cleaned up the fluid before the restart.

A long 24 hours, made even longer by 12 hours of cold temperatures, steady rain and 21 caution flags – though not even close to a record, actually – combined to make the night hours of the most prestigious sports car race in North America miserable for drivers and crew.

But the 55th running of the Rolex 24 At Daytona was one of the most exciting, and certainly most important endurance races in recent memory.

The wild card in the Prototype class, which featured all-new cars this season, was probably the three Cadillac DPi-V.R entries: The No. 5 Mustang Sampling Racing and No. 31 Whelen Engineering Racing cars, which, with Chevrolet power, have taken all three IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championships so far, plus the No. 10 car. Would the teams be as fast as last year?

In a word, yes – in fact, the No. 5 Cadillac DPi of regular drivers Joao Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi, helped out for this long race by Filipe Albuquerque, battled long and hard with the No. 10 Konica Minolta Cadillac DPi of brothers Ricky and Jordan Taylor, longtime co-driver Max Angelelli in his final race, and four-time Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon, in his first Rolex 24 since his debut here in 2007.

With seven minutes to go, Albuquerque was leading in the No. 5, with Ricky Taylor on his tail. At the end of the long frontstretch, leading into a fast left turn, Taylor took the No. 10 car low and inside of Albuquerque. When the No. 5 set up for the left turn, Taylor hit the car in the rear, spinning it out. Albuquerque recovered quickly and at the end, finished only 0.671 seconds behind the No. 10.

The incident was reviewed by IMSA officials who decided to take no action against Taylor, which did not go down well with Albuquerque. “I don’t race like that, to be hit in the back. He didn’t even wait for me, he just took off,” Albuquerque said. “Clearly I was hit in the back. It was not a clean move. I think everyone saw that.”

Even team owner Wayne Taylor was nervous, as TV cameras showed him burying his head in his hands after the No. 5 spun, likely anticipating that it would be a controversial call.

Regardless, Jordan Taylor said the win was a “relief. We’ve come close so many times. I’m just proud of my brother. He made it happen today.”

Indeed, Ricky Taylor’s pursuit of the No. 5 car was dramatic during the last 24 minutes after the green flag fell following the 21st caution period, this one for debris on the track. Taylor frequently braked hard enough to lock the wheels and several times overshot the corner as he charged after Albuquerque.

In the end, though, it was great news for Cadillac – finishing first and second place in its first time out. The No. 31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac DPi, led often in the first third of the race until electrical problems, a bent control arm and a flat tire dropped the car to a sixth-place finish in class, 14th overall.

Third place went to the No. 90 Visit Florida Racing Multimatic/Riley LM P2 car of Marc Goossens, Renger van der Zande and Rene Rast. “No one expected us to last for 24 hours,” Goossens said. “That just shows how strong this little team is. Right now we have to look at the big picture.”

Fourth was the No. 2 Tequila Patron Nissan DPi, the team that won both the 2016 Rolex and Twelve Hours of Sebring. Drivers Scott Sharp, Ryan Dalziel and the star of both races last year, Pipo Derani, were three laps behind the two Cadillacs.

Ostensibly taking the hard luck award – again – were the two Mazda DPi cars, which during pre-season practice were among the fastest Prototypes. They finished 40th and 46th overall in the field of 55 entries after multiple problems, ranging from a broken transmission to a major fire from a blown engine.

In the other Prototype class, Prototype Challenge, it was slightly less compelling, with the No. 38 Performance Tech car finishing 22 laps ahead of second place, the No. 2 BAR1 car. The Performance Tech driver lineup of James French, Kyle Masson, Nicholas Boulle and 17-year-old Patricio O’Ward is one of the youngest in the history of the race, but they did what they had to do. “Twice around the clock, a lot can go wrong,” French said, “and to come here and win it was amazing. But we kept it clean and here we are.”

Next up for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship is the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh From Florida, held at the historic road course in Central Florida March 15-18.