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Former F1 star Kevin Magnussen is all set for the next chapter of his life - the IMSA SportsCar Championship. The Danish driver will participate in the "real racing" with the 2025 Rolex 24 Daytona, set to take place at the Daytona International Speedway at Daytona Beach, Florida.
Magnussen will be a part of Team BMW M Team RLL in the GTP category. He will drive the BMW M Hybrid V8 sling with drivers: Philipp Eng, Dries Vanthoor, and Raffaele Marciello. Ahead of his IMSA competition, the former Haas F1 driver seemed elated and charged up.
When asked the reason behind it, the Danish star said that he was all excited to be a part of "real racing," or in other words, endurance racing. Speaking about it further, he told TheRace.com:
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“I'm very much looking forward to going into something that I feel is real racing, if you want - not to take anything away from Formula 1, but for me, it's kind of been- there are Formula 1 drivers and then there are racing drivers. And I've always felt like a racing driver - also a Formula 1 driver, but very much a racing driver."
Magnussen then added on his preparation for the IMSA competition:
“It's a big challenge, because one of the biggest races is the first one [in IMSA]. I’ve come straight off from one season that finishes very late in the year. So actually, I've not had that much progression."
The 32-year-old completed his 10th year in Formula 1 in 2024, where he racked up 16 points, and finished the season in P15. His haul was 25 points lesser than his teammate, Nico Hulkenberg, who finished in P11.
Magnussen boasts a total of 187 F1 race entries, where he amassed 202 career points, a pole position, and three fastest laps, one podium, but no race wins.
Kevin Magnussen unraveled how Endurance Racing was different from F1
In the interview published by The Race, Kevin Magnussen also unraveled how he found endurance racing to be different from Formula 1.
Here's what he said:
"Where I came from [F1], only 10 first cars get points. Here, it's a long race. You need to keep the car clean. Of course, if you're fighting for the win at the very end, you go for it."
"That's clear. But it is a very different situation with BMW. I’m going to be much, much more competitive, I think, towards the front of the field, than I've been in Formula 1."
Kevin Magnussen returned to Haas and Formula 1 in 2022, after one-year hiatus in 2021. However, he was shown the exit door from Formula 1 after the Gene Haas-owned team decided to sign Alpine driver Esteban Ocon and Ferrari prodigy Oliver Bearman for the 2025 season.
