Mike Rockenfeller to make NASCAR debut at Watkins Glen Cup

Mike Rockenfeller has done it all in endurance and touring car racing with overall wins in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona, and Nürburgring 24 Hours, class wins in the Spa 24 Hours and 12 Hours of Sebring, and champions in the Le Mans Series LMP1 and Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters. On 21 August, he will add NASCAR to his decorated résumé as he runs the Cup Series race at Watkins Glen International for Spire Motorsports in the #77 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. He is also contracted to race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval on 9 October.

“Attracting world-class talent like Mike Rockenfeller is such an honor for Spire Motorsports,” said Spire Motorsports president Bill Anthony. “Mike is a talented, globally accomplished driver and we’re thrilled to introduce him to NASCAR. We’ve invested in getting Mike up to speed quickly through the Driver Familiarisation Test and our partners at Chevrolet have generously offered simulation time for him. Everyone at Spire Motorsports is motivated and committed to providing Mike with a great effort for Watkins Glen and the Charlotte Roval.

Since retiring from DTM following the 2021 season, the 2013 series champion has committed more to sports car racing by contesting IMSA’s Michelin Endurance Cup with Ally Cadillac Racing, a programme that began that year. Sharing the #48 Cadillac DPi with fellow Le Mans winners Kamui Kobayashi and José María López and seven-time Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson, Rockenfeller and the team’s best finish is fifth at Daytona followed by a sixth at Watkins Glen.

In 2021, the #48 finished second overall at the Rolex 24. Rockenfeller won the 2010 overall as a member of Action Express Racing, who prepares the Ally Racing #48 and assisted NASCAR in developing the Next Gen Cup car.

“Since starting my professional racing career back in the early 2000s, I’ve always kept a close eye on NASCAR,” Rockenfeller commented. “What’s more, after teaming up with Jimmie Johnson, one of the heroes of the sport, my respect and appreciation for NASCAR has grown. It’s an immensely competitive series with some of the world’s greatest drivers racing wheel-to-wheel, merely centimeters apart. Room for error is minimal, at best. Watkins Glen is a difficult track in any car but given how sensitive and big a NASCAR Cup Series car is, I think this will be an even bigger challenge.”

Despite being an Audi factory driver, which included spending his entire DTM career and winning the 2010 Le Mans overall with the marque, Rockenfeller is closely affiliated with Chevrolet via Cadillac and Corvette. He ran the 2018 and 2019 24 Hours of Le Mans in Corvette Racing’s GTE Pro entry, while his IMSA starts and 2017 12 Hours of Sebring victory came with the brand between 2013 and 2019.

Other achievements include winning the 2005 FIA GT2 Championship, 2005 24 Hours of Le Mans and Spa 24 Hours GT2, and the 2006 Nürburgring 24 Hours all with Porsche. He is one of four drivers to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans and Rolex 24 in the same year.

“I’ve been fortunate to race LMP prototypes, DTM, and GTs, but now I’m ready to get my name out there in NASCAR,” continued Rockenfeller. “This is a huge honour for me to be racing the No. 77 NationsGuard Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, and I want to say thank you to Spire Motorsports for giving me this opportunity to start a new chapter in my career.”

The Neuwied native will be the fifth German to compete in the Cup Series, joining Lothar Motschenbacher (1970), Rolf Stommelen and Fritz Schultz (1971), and Klaus Graf (2004), all of whom made one-off starts. Like Rockenfeller, Graf has extensive sports car racing experience and the two have shared grids at Le Mans and Daytona.

Rockenfeller’s entry for Watkins Glen also makes it an especially diverse race as he will compete against Daniil Kvyat (Russian), Loris Hezemans (Dutch), Kimi Räikkönen (Finnish), potentially Tarso Marques (Brazilian), and Cup full-timer Daniel Suárez (Mexican) in an otherwise American-dominated grid. It will be the most nationalities represented in a Cup race since the 2013 Watkins Glen race that featured six drivers born outside the United States (Marcos Ambrose and Owen Kelly are Australian, Ron Fellows is Canadian, Victor Gonzalez Jr. is Puerto Rican, Juan Pablo Montoya is Colombian, Max Papis is Italian).

The Spire #77 has been mainly split between Landon Cassil and Josh Bilicki, though Justin Allgaier made a start at Bristol Dirt. The car is thirty-fourth in owner points with Cassill holding its best finish of fifteenth in the season-opening Daytona 500.