Crystal Report export to Excel - date formatting issue

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I need some help here.  I have a Crystal report that contains a sub-report with a date field.  My goal is to export the report from X3, go to Excel then to a pivot table and use this date field as a major sorting point.  My issue is the date field (from the sub-report) is not being "formatted" as a date during the export process.  Excel is showing it as "general" formatting.  I can select the entire column - choose date format but for some reason that still does not allow the pivot table to "recognize" the field as a date.  If I physically click in the each date cell in Excel - then click out of it; the pivot table will then recognize the field as a date.  Very strange but I cannot click in hundreds of cells individually.    From X3 - I have tried all of the export formats with no luck.  I have tried many Crystal date formats of the date field (in the sub-report) but none of the changes I make in Crystal seem to matter when exporting to Excel (via X3).  Note - if I export direct from Crystal (not using X3 to run the report) - Excel does recognize the field as a date and the pivot table works correctly.  I assume my issue is the X3 export.  Thanks in advance for any input.