Series on a Roll; Teams raise their games for '05.(Motorsports)(Grand American Series )

Byline: BILL McGUIRE

The Grand American Series begins the 2005 season as something of an embarrassment... an embarrassment of riches, that is.

For the season-opening Rolex 24 at Daytona, the entry list showed 33 GT cars and 29 Daytona Prototypes with more than 60 legitimate name drivers from the ranks of NASCAR, open-wheel and sports car racing. Naturally, the scene should calm down and chill out once the regular season settles in at Homestead in March, but early momentum is never a bad thing.

While around a dozen Day-tona Prototypes will contest the entire schedule, perhaps more at some events, the team to beat is still Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates. Last year's co-champion Scott Pruett will have a new co-driver, Luis Diaz, who moves over from the team's second car to replace Max Papis. Meanwhile, sports car veterans Stefan Johansson and Cort Wagner will handle Ganassi's second Lexus-Riley. If the points race gets close, a third car could appear, with drivers supplied from Ganassi's deep roster of IRL and NASCAR talent.

The SunTrust Racing Pontiac-Riley of Wayne Taylor, with Max Angelelli co-driving, applied the pressure on Ganassi's title run last year and can be expected to do the same this year. Howard-Boss Motorsports' Crawford-Pontiacs and Doug Goad's Spirit of Daytona operation also figure to be strong contenders. The Doran chassis is competitive, in the hands of the Doran-Lista works team, Lexus-powered with Didier Theys and Jan Magnussen on board, or with the Pontiac-powered Bell Motorsports effort of Terry Borcheller and ...