The No. 57 Acura NSX GT3 looks like any other Grand Touring Daytona sedan entered in this weekend’s 57th running of the Rolex 24 At Daytona, but the story of this team has a unique gender twist.

The Heinricher Racing car sports an international, and all female, team of drivers. Heinricher has the potential to be in the mix for a class win when the checkered flag falls at Daytona International Speedway on Sunday.

The roster is anchored by Britain’s Katherine Legge, who is considered one of the world’s best road racers.

“I don’t think if it matters if we are female or not female,” Legge said in a recent telephone interview. “One of my favorite sayings is that the car does not know the difference between a female and male driver.”

She said this team may look like a gimmick, but boasts all the ingredients — funding, equipment, driving talent — to stand atop the podium in Daytona’s Victory Lane.

“I’m really excited,” Legge said. “There are only a handful of cars going on the grid thinking they can win this, if you look at equipment and driver lineup.

“We are one of those teams. I really think we have that chance. It will be in our hands and in the hands of the Gods of luck. We can win this thing. At the moment this is the most important race to win. And, I want that watch so bad.”

The “watch” is a Rolex Daytona Cosmograph, which has a retail value of about $20,000. It’s value as a race trophy – priceless. Each winning driver from each of the four Rolex 24 classes is awarded one of these classic timepieces.

The brainchild of this all-female effort is American Jackie Heinricher, who started this project more than two years ago.

The Air Force veteran founded her own biotech company, Booshoot Technology, based in Sun Valley, Idaho. She is a “gentlewoman racer” in road racing, which means she pays a team a fee to race against professional drivers in series around the world.

As a race fan, she has watched young, American female drivers venture to Europe in search of greater racing opportunities.

“I started having this vision to bring these top women professionals together to race a season together,” Heinricher said.

She first broached the idea to Legge, who encouraged the independent business entrepreneur to pull the deal together.

“I met Jackie a few years ago and she told me her idea of an all-female team with the best drivers in the world,” Legge said. ‘She said she was going out to find funding for it, and, she did!

“She kept me up on what was happening the whole time and did exactly what she said she was going to do.”

The global corporate giant in on this adventure is Caterpillar. When funding was secured Legge suggested Heinricher work with Meyer Shank Racing, owned in part by another go-getter Michael Shank, whose car won Rolex 24 overall in 2012.

“It is really tough to put these types of deals together,” Legge said. “She did a great job. She chose Meyer Shank Racing because they were the best option for us and what we wanted to do. And, here we are.”

Legge said she would not have been part of this team if Heinricher had not signed the most talented female drivers available. The lineup is gold-star quality.

Simona de Silvestro is a former IndyCar driver who has been a Formula One test driver. She has been called the “Swiss Missile” and most recently competed in the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship.

Christina Nielsen is a two-time IMSA class champion. The Danish driver was brought in to complete the Rolex lineup because Heinricher injured her back in a crash testing the car in December.

And there is the woman with two names filling in the final position. Brazil’s Bia Figueiredo goes by the name of Ana Beatriz in the United States.

She is the only woman to win multiple Indy Lights races. Beatriz put the No. 57 on the GTD provisional pole when she posted fast speed during a Roar Before The 24 test session earlier this month.

Beatriz, wheeling the No. 57, posted a speed of 121.430 mph over Daytona’s super-fast, 3.56-mile road course.

“They say ‘just drive as fast as you can’ and that’s what I tried to do and fortunately we got a really good position,” said the Brazilian driver after posting the quick lap. “This shows we are really competitive and I’m happy for the team.”

Heinricher and Legge handpicked this unique lineup.

“When Jackie and I spoke about it at first, we talked about who we wanted to do this with and both of us it was very clear,” Legge said. “For both of us, they were the only names that made sense, so we agreed on that from the get-go; that the only way this would work is if we had the best drivers in the world in the car, and they are some of the best drivers in the world.”

This is not the first all-female team to compete in the Rolex 24. In 1994 Linda Pobst, Kat Teasdale, Margy Eatwell, Tami Rai Busby and Leigh O’Brien combined to drive a Chevy Camaro in the GT Class at Daytona and Sebring.

“I did those two races and just loved it,” Pobst told racing.com in 2013.

The No. 57 Heinricher Racing Acura is not a one-and-done race deal. The team will race the entire season and go for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in the GTD class. Legge finished second in that title race in 2018.

“My role will be making sure the drivers know they have my support,” said Heinricher. “A winning team can be summed up in six words; ‘we simply believe in one another.’”

Part of the mission is to get more young women to compete in racing and stay stateside. Legge said the female racing population is thin right now.

“There aren't that many girls coming up through the ranks,” Legge said. “Give girls positive role models that aren't just stripping off and posing on the front of a car.

“You go to a race track and you see ‘Grid Girls’ and very rarely do you see engineers, people working behind the scenes, working on race cars. If you are a parent, and you have a kid who wants to be in racing, I wanted to show that that's not the only way you can do it.”

AP writer Jenna Fryer contributed to this report.

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