Oryx Racing. Humaid Al Masaood. In At The Deep End

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In spite of these issues, the UAE-based operation – manned by no more than ten people – stuck to their pre-event objective. Finishing was still the priority. It didn’t matter where. But with Kane, Al Masaood nor new recruit Saeed Al Mehairi receiving more than a few hours sleep, the potential for disaster only grew as the hours ticked by.

“There’s lots of opportunities for making mistakes at Daytona. It’s a difficult circuit, and there’s a lot of traffic. You’ve just got to stay focused. There’s really no other way to do it. Keep aware and just basically press on. It does get cold at night and there was even a bit of fog, and all these things make life tricky.

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“But I think we were very relaxed. Generally we don’t make things high pressure at Oryx. Plus having Saeed come on-board was great. He’s a great guy, great driver and we enjoyed having him there. Hopefully we’ll do something else in the future.”

Despite all-too many trips down pit-road, the #74 Audi R8 was still running when the chequered flag finally fell at 3pm local time. For Al Masaood behind the wheel, this was more than an achievement: it was a realisation.

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“I was quite tired, but it was so great! It really was. To bring the car back and know that, yeah, we’d had some issues, but we’d got the job done. And to know that we have the potential. That was really what it was. If we’d been nowhere and struggled and struggled then it would have been very, very depressing. We weren’t setting records but we were putting in great consistency, which for those types of races is what you need to do. We took it as a learning experience and everyone loved it. We did come out of it thinking that we’d stepped forward.”

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There’s just under a month to go now before the next race. Though their recent baptism of fire may not have gone quite as smoothly as previous examples, Humaid Al Masaood knows that his team has the potential to take Grand-Am by storm.

“It’s going to be good. We know it’s going to be difficult because the grids are big and we know the drivers are good. But I think we’re on it. For sure we’ll be trying for podiums, and we’ll try and win races. That’s just the way we work!”

Shots By Camden Thrasher