Acura qualifies second, fifth for 2026 Rolex 24 at Daytona

• Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian pair of Acura ARX-06s kick off the season with two top-five starting positions
• Acura seeks a return to victory lane in the first race of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season following victories in 2021, '22 and '23
• Acura MSR and Honda Racing Corporation USA look to build on strong 2025 season

Acura got their 2026 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship campaign off to a strong start today, qualifying both Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian ARX-06s in the top-five for this weekend's 64th running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

Renger van der Zande-a two-time Rolex 24 race winner-qualified the #93 Phillips 66 Acura ARX-06 on the front row as he and his teammates Nick Yelloly, four-time and reigning Honda-powered NTT INDYCAR SERIES champion Alex Palou, and Honda Formula Dream Project driver Kaku Ohta try to get Acura back into victory lane at Daytona.

Acura is a three-time winner of the Rolex 24 at Daytona in recent years, winning back-to-back-to-back in 2021, 2022 and 2023, including with Meyer Shank Racing for the '22 and '23 wins. Last year, Acura MSR scored P2 in the twice-round-the-clock classic with the #60 machine of Tom Blomqvist, Colin Braun, Scott Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist finishing just 1.335 seconds behind first place.

The sister #60 Acura ARX-06 enters this year's event with three of the same four drivers-AJ Allmendinger will be joining Braun, Dixon and Blomqvist for the 2026 iteration of the race. The four drivers share ten Rolex wins between them (Braun 3, Blomqvist 2, Dixon 4, Allmendinger 1) and will roll off fifth for Saturday's race.

Rolex 24 at Daytona Acura Qualifying Results
Qualified second - #93 Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06. Renger van der Zande, co-drivers will be Nick Yelloly, Alex Palou and Kaku Ohta.
Qualified fifth - #60 Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06. Tom Blomqvist, co-drivers will be Colin Braun, Scott Dixon and AJ Allmendinger.

Quotes
Renger van der Zande (#93 Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06) qualified second: "I think this truly showcases what we've learned over the course of our first year working together as a group. There are so many people, so many resources, and so much talent, but we still needed to find a cohesive way of working together-and that is exactly what you see now when you look at our team. We're going into our second year of this Meyer Shank Racing and Honda Racing Corporation USA effort, and the homework we've done has been incredible. I've never seen it at this level before in any team. The only thing that we needed to improve last season was the execution, and today was a good example that we have learned how to do exactly that. P1 would have been nice, but I think for now we should be happy with P2. We have a front row starting position at Daytona in our #93 Acura ARX-06 and a long race ahead of us. We'll stay calm, stay cool, and go from here."

Tom Blomqvist (#60 Acura Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06) qualified fifth: "The field is very, very close. We had a really promising practice session this morning, so we were feeling pretty good going into qualifying but we just didn't have a great session. I got a bit out of sync and then another car spun in front of us and I had to kind of back it up. I think we missed the balance a little bit in qualifying and it wasn't as good as we had expected. Luckily, we don't have too much to worry about with 24 hours of racing ahead of us to move forward."

How to Watch the Rolex 24 at Daytona

• Television coverage for the 64th Rolex 24 at Daytona starts Saturday, January 24, at 1:30 PM ET on NBC for the initial hour of the event. The conclusion of the race will see the Rolex 24 returning to NBC 12:00 PM - 2:00 PM Sunday.
• Live flag-to-flag coverage will be available on NBC Peacock in the US and on IMSA's YouTube channel internationally. Additionally, Radio Le Mans will have live flag-to-flag coverage via IMSA.com.
• Internationally, fans can watch on IMSA's YouTube channel while Radio Le Mans will have live flag-to-flag coverage via IMSA.com.

Acura and HRC US social media content and video links can be found on:

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