Team Welcomes Fans to the AO Racing Headquarters for Family-Focused Event
By Tony DiZinno
ST. CHARLES, Ill. – One oft-repeated motif in motorsports is that the sound of a race car engine warming up is akin to a morning wakeup call that complements your morning coffee.
Imagine both being put together on a crisp, cool, Saturday morning to ignite the vibes you get during an AO Racing autograph session at an IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship event. But instead, this time, the location is AO Racing’s own parking lot.
Indeed, AO Racing debuted its first “Cars and Characters” event – essentially a “cars and coffee” style proceeding, but with a distinct AO Racing flair – last Saturday at the midpoint of a three-week intermission between WeatherTech Championship events at VIRginia International Raceway and Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
AO Racing has made its fan-friendly, family-focused vibes part of its brand, elevating the team’s “Rexy,” “Roxy” and “Spike” dinosaur and dragon mascot characters adorning their respective race cars to somewhat iconic status.
The AO Racing shop, located roughly an hour west of Chicago, served as the location where the team revealed a freshly paved asphalt parking lot to host its fans to see a variety of elements.
The team displayed its two WeatherTech Championship cars and some of their race- and championship-winning trophies alongside nearly a dozen vehicles from team owner PJ Hyett’s personal collection. “Rexy,” the team’s No. 77 Porsche 911 GT3 R (992), left in race-covered livery from its 2024 WeatherTech Championship Grand Touring Daytona Pro (GTD PRO) championship-winning race at Motul Petit Le Mans and “Spike,” the team’s No. 99 ORECA LMP2 07 entry in Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2), welcomed fans to the lot. Of course, the car presence wouldn’t be complete without the mascots, as all three were out in full force.
They then paired those cars with a bounce house, face painting and chalk drawing, food and drink vendors, its merchandise shop, grandstands for stories, car fire-ups and pit stop demonstrations.
And for good measure, a raffle that went on throughout the three-hour event showcased a series of items – from swag bags to a used race tire, remote control cars to a former race suit – to help support the Austin Hatcher Foundation, one of IMSA’s two proud charities.
The team left no stone unturned in its attention to detail, and the three hours flew by as a rotation of cars and stories followed, interspersed by a musical selection that featured Beck’s “Dreams,” the team’s mascot theme song, and more often than not, classic rock jams you’d hear on 97.1, “The Drive,” en route to Chicago. The only thing missing was Chicago radio icon Bob Stroud describing each piece.
Several hundred fans attended the event, with most staying the full duration since you had to be present to win any of the raffle items.
Among the cars discussed and fired up, the Hyett collection ran the gamut from sports cars to NASCAR and open-wheel cars.
The sports car collection was, unsurprisingly, Porsche-dominated. Two iconic older Porsches (the 1983 Rolex 24 At Daytona-winning “Swap Shop” Porsche 935 and a F.A.T. International-liveried Porsche 962 from the early 1990s) made quick appearances.
Its current No. 77 Porsche made three – one with an initial fire-up to kick off proceedings, followed by multiple pit stop demonstrations.
And the capper to the day was an unraced Porsche 911 RSR, the only one of the manufacturer’s GTE-specification cars built that never raced competitively, but in a matching F.A.T.-livery with Hyett, Gunnar Jeannette and Ferdi Porsche’s name above the door panel.
NASCAR got a shoutout with Chase Elliott’s No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE, which won its only race start at the NASCAR Cup Series’ first trip to Road America in 2021.
But perhaps the biggest crowd-pleaser wasn’t a sports car or NASCAR. Sebastien Bourdais’ championship-winning, McDonald’s Panoz DP01 Champ Car chassis driven for Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing in that series’ final season in 2007 got fired up after a couple-minute warmup session. The restoration and management was led by longtime Newman/Haas employee Don Hoevel.
The festive atmosphere was aided by perfect weather conditions, which AO Racing team members admitted were a potential concern going into this debut event given the notoriously fickle Midwest weather which can change on a dime.
What was apparent, though, was the desire of AO Racing team principal Jeannette and the rest of the hard-working AO Racing crew to deliver an “at-track experience at home.” From the preparation of the event to the pristine inner workings of the team’s facility, it was a well-executed event that left little to tweak should an encore occur.
Fan-friendly events at team facilities certainly aren’t a new thing. However, seeing one come out of the gates so strongly provided a good case to ensuring this “Cars and Characters” wasn’t merely a one-off event.