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"         It was a Who&amp;#039;s Who of the world&amp;#039;s best drivers, with open-wheel masters including Helio Castroneves, Paul Tracy and Dan Wheldon; sports car aces such as Hurley Haywood, Johnny O&amp;#039;Connell and Wayne Taylor; and NASCAR&amp;#039;s marquee drivers like Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Jimmy Johnson. And if the long list of stars wasn&amp;#039;t enough, the on track competition was about as close as it gets. Yes, the 2007 Daytona 24 Hours was superb.   Our race weekend began on a high note with the Rolex dinner on Friday night honoring this year&amp;#039;s grand marshal, the incomparable Richard Petty. The King was in fine form, regaling all in attendance with wonderful stories (guess who lodged a protest against Richard&amp;#039;s first big NASCAR win? None other than his father, Lee!). Also honored was the owner of the renowned Brumos Racing sports car team, Bob Snodgrass, who was inducted into the Goodyear Legends of Daytona. In the race, one of his Porsche-powered Rileys finished just off the podium in fourth.   There was drama right from the drop of the flag: Pole-sitter Alex Gurney&amp;#039;s lightning-fast Gainsco Riley/Pontiac tangled with a GT class machine, ending its chance at outright victory in the early going. Nearly a day later, the first, second and third-placed combatants were literally running nose to tail. But in the end it was the Telmex/Target Riley/Lexus driven by Scott Pruett, Salvador Duran and Juan Montoya that took the spoils, followed by the Citgo Riley/Pontiac of Milka Duno, Patrick Carpentier, Darren Manning and Ryan Dalziel, with another Pontiac/Riley ? this one the SunTrust entry piloted by team owner Wayne Taylor, Max Angelelli, Jeff Gordon and Jan Magnussen ? landing in third.   In the GT class, the Gatorade Porsche GT3 Cup car of Carlos de Quesada, Jean-Francois Dumoulin, Scooter Gabel and Marc Basseng took home the victory laurels. Pontiac once again rated highly with the Banner Engineering GXP.R driven by Paul Edwards, Kelly Collins and Andy Pilgrim taking second with another Porsche Cup car, the JLowe Racing SRS/Globus Medical entry of Jim Lowe, Jim Pace, Johannes van Overbeek and Ralf Kelleners, claiming third.   With the first hour of the race airing on network television (Fox) before shuffling off to the Speed Channel, a new audience was exposed to the wonderful world of sports car racing. With its big names and intense competition this year&amp;#039;s Rolex 24 points to a sports car racing resurgence that we heartily welcome. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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