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Van der Zande shares the Ganassi-run #01 Cadillac V-LMDh with Sebastien Bourdais, and this pair – along with endurance extra Scott Dixon – started fourth and finished third in the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona. That was the race debut of the GTP-class cars in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar championship, and while Cadillac looked strong, in the final daylight stints of the race, the V-LMDhs were left a tad breathless by the 2.4-liter twin-turbo Acura ARX-06s that finished 1-2.
However van der Zande sounded confident that the Cadillacs will be better tuned to the demands of the bumpy 3.74-mile Sebring course, venue for the classic 12-hour race which will be IMSA’s second round of the season.
“We had two really good days of testing,” he said. “I felt for the first time we could really work on the car and the car ran flawlessly. Building up to the Daytona race was something where …