The MPME Scion tC, sporting a Turbonetics turbocharger kit, BFGoodrich R1 tires, and numerous Hotchkis Performance suspension components, found itself amongst the top-five fastest cars in a race with seventy participants, and vehicles ranging from $500,000 Daytona Prototypes to factory-backed Honda S2000's and Ford Mustangs. The challenge of taking a tC with a base price of $17,000 into battle against famous thoroughbred racers like the Mustangs and S2000's wasn't the least bit imposing for the team.

"That's part of Scion's racing heritage — bringing a knife to a gun fight and walking away victorious. We might not have won on our debut, but I think our little car earned the respect in the racing community," said Pruett.

Beset by aftermarket wheel issues only and hour into the race, the MPME Team Scion/Modified Magazine team soon found themselves in the pits for an extended amount of time to repair the damage caused by the wheel failure.

"That was the frustrating part of the race for us — we were poised to spoil the party for some of the bigger teams, but that's hard to do when you have an unexpected wheel failure that damages a lot of components. Everything made by Scion or TRD performed flawlessly, as did almost every other racing component on the car. If not for the wheel issues, I'm confident we'd be celebrating a win in the tC's endurance racing debut," said Pruett.

With many hours lost due to repairs and the chance at victory lost almost before the race had started, the team was faced with packing up and going home, or pressing on to log as many laps as possible and try for a top-10 finish in class.

"We completed 462 laps at the 3.0 mile long track — 1,386 miles, worked our way up to ninth, and set a fastest lap during the race that bettered the two factory Mustangs that finished first and second in our class. I'm sad we didn't win, but our Scion tC passed every single car on track at some time during the race — even the Daytona Prototype. Everyone can hold their head high after the performance the car and team delivered. We.ll be back to go after the victory in 2008, and hope to run all 25 hours without interruption," noted Pruett.