This time last year I knew very little about the Grand American Rolex Sportscar Series. I knew it involved the Daytona 24hrs, a race I'd heard about for years along with the other big sportscar events Le Mans and Sebring. I knew it wasn't part of the ALMS, but I hadn't a clue what kind of cars raced there now.

That changed after the tyre tests at Homestead, Miami during start of December 2004 when one of my favourite drivers, Stefan Johansson, drove a Daytona Prototype car for the first time.

He went on to sign for the Chip Ganassi team and I embarked on a journey that will entail me traveling across the world.

From the start I was eager to learn about the cars involved in the series. The GT cars were the easy part, mainly Porsche's & BMW's, I recognized those from the ALMS & FIA GT series I'd always followed.

The Daytona Prototypes were another beast entirely and one that would take a bit of time to get my head around. It took me ages to work out what they reminded me of then finally one day it came to me - smaller, shorter, versions of the Group C sportscars which had raced around the world in the 1980's. These were the cars which first got me hooked on sportscar racing.

So, once I'd worked out the cars, who the people driving them were and which tracks the races took place on, I was ready to enjoy the series.

Being across the Atlantic in the UK news of the Grand American Rolex Sports Car Series is very thin on the ground. The main motorsport magazine Autosport barely mentioned series while there was no hope of seeing live footage of the races on television.

Thankfully I found three great sources of information, this site garra-fans.com (especially the forums!), the series website at grandamerican.com and the ever improving official web radio service presented by Mike Paz. Without these I wouldn't have known half of what was going on in the series or made so many new friends.

The 2005 season turned out to be a roller coaster one for Stefan and his team mate Cort Wagner in their #02 New Century Mortgage Chip Ganassi Racing Lexus Riley. That first win has been elusive with their best result being a 2nd at Mont Tremblant.

However there is still one race left of the current season, to be held in Mexico City on November 5th, and I will be there. Lets hope the series which has given me so much enjoyment from afar will not disappoint on closer inspection. I'll let you know!

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