Cadillac leads Daytona 24 Hours

The number five Northstar LMP of Max Angelelli, Wayne Taylor and Eric van de Poele led the day-night enduro by the best part of a lap from Rob Dyson's Riley & Scott MkIII.

The car lost a lap early on with a brake problem, but canny tactics brought the car back onto the lead lap during one of the many safety-car periods that blighted the first portion of the race.

Angelelli took to the front during the sixth hour when the Dyson car was delayed under the safety car.

The Italian then extended his lead over the veteran owner-driver.

Dyson's Lincoln-engined R&S had led the early going in the hands of polewinner James Weaver before a minor problem in the first hour handed the lead to the Doran Racing Ferrari 333SP started by Didier Theys.

Former LeMans winner Mauro Baldi and then Canadian Ross Bentley maintained the lead into the fifth hour until the airbox caught fire.

The Ferrari was still undergoing repairs at the quarter-distance mark.

Nearly all the expected front-runners in the sports racing class hit trouble early on.

Second qualifier Alex Caffi spun his Risi Competizione Ferrari on the opening lap, but the car needed an extended stop for a new gearbox soon after Allan McNish took over in the second hour.

McNish then managed only one lap before colliding with a slower car, which necessitated an hour-long pitstop to repair the front suspension.

The Johansson-Matthews Reynard 2KQ ran third in the opening laps in the hands of team boss Stefan Johansson before flying debris damaged the car's right front corner, which required 24 minutes to fix.

The Konrad Lola-FordB98/10 was established in third place until a gearbox cooler problem dropped the car back in the fifth hour.

The second Cadillac was delayed in the second hour when the right rear wheel refused to come off at its second pitstop.

Andy Wallace, Butch Leitzinger and Franck Lagorce had fought back up to 10th place just before quarter-distance when an undisclosed problem was losing this entry yet more time in the pits.

The high attrition rate among the sports racers allowed the GTO cars to fill out much of the top 10 at six hours.

The best of the three ORECA Chrylsers was running an incredible third place, just five laps behind the leader.

Olivier Beretta, Karl Wendlinger and Dominique Dupuy had encountered no problems in their Viper GTS-R which was looking like a good outside bet for victory.

Porsche's new 911 GT3-R was dominating the GTU division as expected.

The G&W team, whose roster of drivers includes triple Porsche Supercup champion Patrick Huisman, led Alex Job Racing by less than a lap.