A few months ago, the Scott Tucker-owned racing team Level 5 Motorsports prepared for the 24 Hours of Le Mans, a important endurance race in the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup series. As with any team, Level 5 geared to win. But surprisingly, the group opted out from the option to qualify for a starting position in the race, instead taking the dead last spot for its 2 Microsoft Office-sponsored LMP2 cars, Nos. 55 and 95.

“Qualifying for a 24-hour race is meaningless,” explained a Level 5 mechanic at the time. “Anything that’s not directly related to winning, we’re going to opt out of.”

The Level 5 Motorsports team’s 2011 year has proved it a versatile, prominent team filled with knowledge, skill and enthusiasm. Commanding the podium at the majority of the competitions it entered-including winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans, and podium at Imola and Sebring, among others-is proof that the Scott Tucker-owned, Microsoft Office-sponsored team has found a winning formula in its schedule, race strategy and drivers, including Tucker, Luis Diaz and Christophe Bouchut. While they began a final quarter of an already great year with the ModSpace American Le Mans Monterey provided by Patron mid-September, all their ducks seemed to be in a row: their formula had been proven time and time again as reliable for an effective winning effort. But this race comprised one wild card, or wild car, as the case might be-the team would finally debut the HPD ARX-01g they had announced they were switching to mid-season.

Fast cars, feelings, tension and hours of motion: Aside from mood music, that’s the makings of any feature film-to be fair, one that was already made, but additionally one which might be equally as successful if filmed again with the exact same cast.

That cast is Level 5 Motorsports, the team featured in “Daytona Dream,” this year’s Drive Videos feature film that chronicled the emotional, action-packed journey on the Scott Tucker-owned team to the Grand-Am series Rolex 24 at Daytona, an institution in American culture far beyond racing circles.

Scott Tucker is without question an excellent race car driver, but if you add the fact he competes not just in the ALMS and the ILMS but the Ferrari Challenge series, Tucker becomes a great race car driver-unbelievable not merely because the schedule he keeps, but as a result of his continual success on the track. The first FC race of the 2011 year for Tucker and his Level 5 Motorsports team was the debut of the Ferrari 458 Challenge-the 5th model to be used since the series began during the early 90s-at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif.

2011 – For the past two races in which Level 5 Motorsports has competed, the team’s main strategy has had to be simply: Avoid traffic. Owner-driver Scott Tucker purchased two Honda prototypes for the team mid-season this year, and so far the cars have given the team very little to worry about. At American Le Mans Series Monterey at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway earlier in September, Tucker nailed a first-place finish in the first of the two prototypes. Later, in October, both LMP2 entries rode in Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. Hoping to fend off the top-of-the-field Nissan entries, Tucker and his team drove the cars to another first-place finish. After the Nissan experienced mechanical problems, the Level 5 Honda HPD ARX-01g entry gained a multiple-lap lead. The drivers of the winning No. 33-Tucker, Christophe Bouchut and Joao Barbosa-needed only to maintain the lead and avoid traffic. As Barbosa said, the track was crowded, and collisions could easily happen.

Scott Tucker and his Level 5 Motorsports teammates recently began the final quarter of a racing year that has included numerous podium appearances, multiple car changes, incredible accomplishments and yet still room for improvement. Tucker, owner and driver for Level 5, has been a leader for the team despite the rookie status he maintained merely months ago. His tight, balanced driving has earned him top honors in the American Le Mans Series as Rookie of the Year and Champion Driver in 2010. His races often end with stints on the podium, and his career has only just begun.

2011 – Following a superb, winning performance at Petit Le Mans last weekend, Scott Tucker and his Level 5 Motorsports team head next to Italy for one of two races remaining on the 2011 schedule. With the season winding down for all five series in which Tucker entered this year, he and the team are able to devote full focus to the remaining ILMC competition. With the ILMC points they earned with their class win at Petit Le Mans, the team seeks a vice championship in ILMC competition, ending with races in Italy and Zhuhai, China.

For the second year in a row, the American Le Mans Series Monterey at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway on the Monterey Peninsula was a six-hour enduro race that led drivers around the circuit into the post-sundown darkness.

Previously, the race had been four hours, with the addition of two extra hours in 2010. For Scott Tucker and his Level 5 Motorsports racing team, the two extra hours allow for some breathing room. “We always try to run a clean race, but little mistakes can add up,” Tucker said last year. “Two extra hours can be a huge advantage even for experienced teams because of those unexpected things you tend to run into with endurance races.”

Scott Tucker and his awesome Level 5 Motorsports teammates traded their racing jumpsuits for suit jackets and slacks for the American Le Mans Series season banquet a couple weeks ago. The banquet happened to honor various achievements through the 2011 season by various members of each motorsports team in the league.

The Level 5 Motorsports team’s performance at Petit Le Mans recently was a testament to the fact that you can set yourself up for success. Team owner-driver Scott Tucker has spent the last full year preparing for the team’s LMP2 class debut at Road Atlanta in Petit Le Mans, the final race of the American Le Mans Series season. Tucker built the team, they practiced, and they were all but perfect at the race.