Meyer Shank Racing – Syndication Server

MSR to host 500 veterans and first responders at Thermal

Meyer Shank Racing has partnered with the Folds of Honor military charity to host 500 veterans and first responders during this weekend’s IndyCar Series race at The Thermal Club. The Folds of Honor organization, which MSR describes as “a nonprofit …

Meyer Shank Racing has partnered with the Folds of Honor military charity to host 500 veterans and first responders during this weekend’s IndyCar Series race at The Thermal Club.

The Folds of Honor organization, which MSR describes as “a nonprofit organization that provides educational scholarships to the spouses and children of US military service members and first responders who have fallen or been disabled while serving our country and communities,” will be given full access to the team and its operation at the event held in California’s Coachella Valley.

“Supporting our military and first responders is something that my family as well as Jim Meyer and his family value deeply.” said team co-owner Mike Shank. “Partnering with Folds of Honor is an incredible opportunity for us to give back and recognize the service of these heroes and hopefully for them to have a little fun and see some competitive racing. We’re honored to welcome them to the track and share our passion for racing with them.”
Lt. Col. Dan Rooney, founder and CEO of Folds of Honor, expressed his appreciation for MSR’s benevolence.

“We are grateful to Meyer Shank Racing and its outstanding team for supporting Folds of Honor and our recipients during the Thermal Club IndyCar Grand Prix,” he said. “IndyCar, its affiliated teams and its fans have a long history of patriotism and honoring American heroes. MSR understands the importance of an education and is doing something about it. They are making a life-changing difference.”

Acura/BMW pit skirmish brings drama to Sebring’s third quarter

The sun is beginning to set on the 2025 12 Hours of Sebring with three hours to go, and the cars under safety car primed for a restart. From Brendon Hartley’s off in the fifth hour, the race has been entirely green all the way to the closing stages …

The sun is beginning to set on the 2025 12 Hours of Sebring with three hours to go, and the cars under safety car primed for a restart.

From Brendon Hartley’s off in the fifth hour, the race has been entirely green all the way to the closing stages of the ninth hour. There were a handful of spins and offs, but until Casper Stevenson in the No. 27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin looped around at Turn 17 and was stranded at the apex with 3h17m remaining, it was green, green, green.

Stephenson’s spin prompted a safety car, though, which reset the field, wiped all the gaps and caused a flurry of pit activity as the 10th hour began.

The No. 31 Whelen Cadillac took the lead at the stops under safety car from the No. 7 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963, which has dropped to second. The No. 6 Porsche sits third, with the No. 93 Acura fourth and the No. 25 BMW up to fifth, having pitted just before the caution.

High drama occurred for two GTP runners in the pit lane during the yellow. Tom Blomqvist in the No. 60 Acura MSR ARX-06 and Philipp Eng in the No. 24 BMW Team RLL collided while exiting the pit lane. Blomqvist pulled out and tagged the right rear of the M Hybrid V8, damaging the front-left corner of his ARX-06 and its steering, prompting him to stop at the exit.

The No. 24 didn’t get away unscathed either, requiring a second stop under caution for a rear clip change, tire change and further inspection as a result of the impact. Both cars are tumbling down the order and out of contention as a result.

Elsewhere in the class, there was drama for Lamborghini’s SC63 — retired with suspected floor damage after 256 laps, marking a tough end to a tough week for the Riley-run prototype and a second DNF in two races to start the season.

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In LMP2 the No. 04 Crowdstrike by APR ORECA is out front, though the team will be frustrated after losing a big lead. Malthe Jakobsen stretched the team’s advantage to 1m11s during his most recent stint, before the team was handed a drive-through for failing to adhere to tire operational requirements which reduced the gap to 50s. That advantage has now been totally wiped out.

The No. 22 United Autosports USA ORECA is second with the No. 11 TDS Racing entry third. The top seven in the class are on the lead lap.

Meanwhile, Pratt Miller Motorsports’ ORECA became the fourth retirement early in hour seven. The car, which suffered an oil leak earlier in the race, was withdrawn due to a “technical issue” after 144 laps.

GTD Pro feels like anyone’s game now, with four brands in the top four. The No. 65 Ford Mustang holds the top spot, with the No. 4 Corvette second, the No. 48 Paul Miller BMW third and the No. 77 AO Porsche fourth.

GTD was drama-heavy, with multiple retirements and leaders since the halfway mark. The No. 34 Conquest Racing Ferrari leads out of nowhere, ahead of the No. 12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus and the No. 57 Winward Mercedes-AMG GT3.

Winward’s car has run like clockwork, the only setback a drive-through for a pit stop infringement (a mechanic working on the car from over the wall) while it was running fourth in the eighth hour.

Wright Motorsports’ Porsche lost track position to a recent infraction too. It fell foul of leaving pit lane with equipment attached and needed to serve a drive through which would drop the No. 120 911 to fourth.

There was a rotten stroke of bad luck for the No. 32 Korthoff Competition Motors Mercedes-AMG GT3 in the seventh hour. Kenton Koch, from the lead, peeled off the circuit in the run to the Turn 7 hairpin with a loss of power that would prove terminal. A huge letdown after such a superb run through the first half of the race for the Ohio-based team.

It left the door open for a new leader. The pole-sitting No. 21 AF Corse Ferrari found itself at the head of the field, but it too would hit trouble after Alessandro Pier Guidi had an off at the end of the eighth hour at Turn 1.

The Italian kept the car out of the wall after running wide and hopping over the grass, briefly losing the lead to the No. 27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin. Zach Robichon aboard the Vantage fell back to second shortly after when Pier Guidi fought back, but with 3h44m left on the clock the Ferrari would slow to a stop at Turn 6. It was an on-the-spot retirement.

The No. 32 and No. 21 were not the only GTD cars to retire in this phase of the race. The No. 19 VDSR Aston Martin is also no longer taking part after a lengthy trip behind the wall.

MSR and Acura: The band is back together and stronger than ever

It’s been an emotional weekend in Daytona for Meyer Shank Racing. Back in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship paddock following a year-long pause due to HRC US’s shift to a single-team approach in GTP with Wayne Taylor Racing in 2024, the …

“I was at Chipotle when I got the call last year, standing there with a brown rice bowl,” team owner Mike Shank told RACER.

“It was David Salters (HRC US’s president) and he said, ‘We’re getting the band back together!’

“I was just overjoyed. I called my wife, I called Jim Meyer, and then the rest of the group. More than anything, I was just proud.

“After the issue (post-Daytona) in 2023, we carried on with life, as tough as it was, came back strong late in the year and would have won the championship (had MSR not received a points deduction for manipulating tire pressure data at the Rolex 24). So I was proud when I found out, more than anything, after so much work.”

Colin Braun, Tom Blomqvist, Helio Castroneves and Simon Pagenaud took MSR and Acura to a commanding Rolex victory in 2023, but controversy overshadowed it in short order. Now, after a year apart, the two organizations are back together with a lot of familiar faces behind the scenes. Richard Dole/Motorsport Images

Acura Meyer Shank Racing is back and — in terms of the size of its program at least — better than ever, with two GTP class ARX-06s and a refreshed driver lineup.

Its full-season driver pool combines returnees Colin Braun and Tom Blomqvist with the new faces of Renger van der Zande, formerly of Cadillac, and Nick Yelloly from BMW Team RLL. For the Rolex 24, the roster expands further, too, with MSR IndyCar regular Felix Rosenqvist, Honda factory driver Kakunoshin Ohta and, courtesy of a deal with Chip Ganassi Racing, Alex Palou and Scott Dixon.

“We all work together on choosing drivers,” Shank said. “We did some number crunching and looked at historic performances and results.

“I had two guys on the No. 60 car that I felt deserved a real shot again with Tom and Colin, that was a no-brainer. Nick and Renger are two guys I’ve known for a long time and competed against.

“For me, they were super solid, fast veteran guys for the No. 93 who know how these cars behave.”

The majority of the team’s 2023 engineering staff are also back for the comeback tour.

“[All of them] deserve to be here,” he continued. “We’ve lost one person from the total group of 23, that’s it. They’re all back with us in different forms, plus we’ve added some new people to strengthen this.

“This model is interesting for us, with us leading the engineering on one car and HRC leading the other. It makes for a strong team effort and we look forward to ironing out the creases and getting our communication channels smooth, which is tough when you have 100 people.”

HRC President David Salters made the magic phone call to get the band back together and, as always, packs the program with some of the best engineering investment in the series. Michael Levitt/Lumen

While the ARX-06 has matured since MSR’s last IMSA race, particularly on the software side, the car is essentially identical on a nuts and bolts level.

Shank says the software updates haven’t counted as a “joker.” This should help the team hit the ground running, particularly in the early part of the season.

“Acura has spent a lot of money getting to this point, so the propensity to go and spend more to develop a BoP car doesn’t make a lot of sense,” he added. “It’s all moving forward and there’s AI coming in now, so we’ve had to make sure we’re up to snuff on that.

“We’ll keep an open mind and, when it’s time, I’m sure we will put something together.”

Following a productive weekend of testing at the Roar — with both cars completing plenty of laps — the level of expectation hasn’t been lowered at all.

“We expect to come back on the podium,” Shank said. “Maybe we don’t win, but there’s no reason we shouldn’t be challenging for the podium places.”

Acura Meyer Shank Racing reveals new look ARX-06s

Acura Meyer Shank Racing’s liveries for the 2025 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship were revealed today by the team and by Honda Racing Corporation USA (HRC US), as both Acura ARX-06s will carry distinct visual identities and primary sponsors. …

The red, white, and blue No.60 Acura will carry primary sponsorship from enterprise AI software company, askROI.

Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun will reunite after finishing runner-up in the 2023 IMSA GTP championship, joined at Daytona by six-time IndyCar Series champion Scott Dixon and Meyer Shank Racing IndyCar driver Felix Rosenqvist.

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HRC US, which will engineer the No.93 Acura, revealed Phillips 66 Lubricants (part of the ConocoPhillips energy company) as the primary sponsor of the new entry – part of a “season-long sponsorship and research and development deal,” according to HRC US.

Phillips 66 will supply engine oil to both Acuras as part of its deal, extending an all-encompassing partnership with Acura service centers and the road car brand in the United States – and also provides Phillips 66 with a ‘rolling laboratory’ to develop and refine lubricants for race and road cars.

The white, black, and red No.93 will be driven by new Acura factory drivers Renger van der Zande and Nick Yelloly, three-time and defending IndyCar champion Alex Palou, and Honda works driver Kakunoshin “Kaku” Ohta.

HRC US President David Salters commented on the new partnership: “We are delighted to partner with the world class Phillips 66 Lubricants. This collaboration allows us to develop our people and technology further in a new era of running our pinnacle ARX-06 electrified race car. We are excited to work together with Phillips 66 Lubricants and use our cutting-edge electrified Acura ARX-06 racing car together as an agile test bed for the best innovations.

“Importantly this partnership helps us develop new commercial skills and opportunities within HRC US and our HRC US New Business Division.”

Meyer Shank considering fly-in crews for IndyCar pit stops

Meyer Shank Racing co-owner Michael Shank is wondering whether it’s time for his NTT IndyCar Series team to take a page from NASCAR programs and begin flying in specialist pit crews to go over the wall and handle the servicing of their cars in …

It’s a practice that’s customary in stock car racing, where former college and professional athletes are recruited to perform the fastest possible tire changes and refueling. It also owns a piece of Indianapolis 500 history, minus the athletic side, in 1965 when Lotus brought in the Wood Brothers’ NASCAR pit crew to bring its unique skills to servicing Jimmy Clark’s car on the way to reaching victory lane.

Today, and with the ever-shrinking separation between IndyCar teams, Shank thinks the practice of asking each car’s mechanics to pull double duty as its pit crew might be ready for a change.

“A thing that I think is coming is professional pit crews,” Shank told RACER. “It’s trying to creep in. Now I’m trying to figure out ways to pay for it. As an example, instead of paying a driver all the money you have left, maybe some of that budget could go towards a pro-spec pit crew that come in.

“I think that’s definitely on its way in, and we’re talking about D1, D2, D3 athletes that are super competitive and make a decent living doing other things but also come in on the weekends. But we’re not there yet though. We’re looking at it. There’s already teams doing a couple of positions that way, but not all of them. But I think it’s going more in that direction over the next year or two.”

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During most IndyCar pit stops, which last approximately eight seconds, it takes longer for the refueler to fill the car’s 17.5-gallon fuel tank than it does for the four tire changers to complete their jobs. On the surface, that dynamic alone would seemingly invalidate any needs for fly-in pit crews. But the tactic of doing “short fills,” the timed refuelings where the tank isn’t filled to capacity and the car is sent once the tire changes are finished — done to eke out an advantage over teams who’ve elected to fill their tanks — to gain positions is becoming more popular in IndyCar.

In that strategical play, the speed of the tire changers and the fast and consistent connecting of the fuel probe to the car has a big impact on how long the car sits in a stationary position. If a dedicated pit crew can produce stops that are a few tenths of a second faster than traditional crews, Shank sees it as a worthy expense.

“Short fills are one thing, and also, when the cars on the ground, it fuels quicker,” he said. “Now, we’re talking slight improvements, like half-a-tenth here, but gravity is our king, right? The quicker the tires are done and the car is on the ground, the quicker the fuel goes, so you want every opportunity to make up a tenth or two and beat you out by a nose. If you can do that, then the whole effort put in to hiring these type of guys worked, as far as I’m concerned.”

When every fraction of a second counts. Michael Levitt/Motorsport Images

Reducing the physical demands on MSR’s full-time crews who look after the Nos. 60 and 66 Hondas, who would handle all aspects of preparing and running the cars, minus going over the wall to service the machines on race day, is another meaningful area under consideration.

“It’s just a lot to put on these guys as the schedule gets tighter and busier,” Shank added. “We ask them for perfection on the cars with car preparation, and then ask for perfection on pit lane performance, right? That’s just a lot to ask of anybody.”

But as Shank found while floating the idea of fly-in pit crews to his team, there’s one factor to contemplate that has nothing to do with speed and consistency.

“There’s two sides to that coin that I’m learning as we try to figure out if this is the right thing to do,” he said. “One side is a lot of the guys — I would say, 70 percent of the people that pit the car — do it because they love it, even though it’s more work for them. They would truly miss that side of it, so you’ve got to weigh that against pure performance. Can we truly make a consistent gain compared to guys that are doing the equivalent to playing both sides of the ball?

“That’s what this is, right? We’re asking them to do all that at a super high-level of execution all weekend with preparing and running the cars in all the sessions, and then at the end, when everybody is the most worn out, to go out there and do the same high level with pit stops. And no joke, there’s all kinds of amazing crews who do it and have done it for a lot longer than I’ve been here, including our own. But what if we could help ourselves by doing it a different way? It’s going to be a delicate rope to walk, in my mind, that’s for sure.”

Acura MSR adds Ohta to Rolex 24 line-up

Acura Meyer Shank Racing has announced that Kakunoshin Ohta will join full-season drivers Renger van der Zande and Nick Yelloly, as well as Alex Palou, for next month’s Rolex 24 At Daytona in the No. 93 Acura ARX-06. The news marks the final piece of the Rolex 24 puzzle for Acura MSR, with the full line-up in the No. 60 already announced as Tom Blomqvist, Colin Braun, Felix Rosenqvist and Scott Dixon.

Ohta, a graduate of the Honda Formula Dream Project, will also join van der Zande and Yelloly in the No. 93 Acura ARX-06 for the Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen and the TireRack.com Battle on the Bricks at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, after impressing the team with his first run in an LMDh car during November’s IMSA test at Daytona.

“We’re really excited to have Ohta with us for three races this year,” said Acura MSR co-owner Mike Shank. “He did a really nice job at the test last month at Daytona and he fit in with the team very well. Now that we have both cars locked in, we’ll put our heads down and get to work at the Roar next month.”

Ohta prepared for his test debut by making two trips Indianapolis to use Honda Racing Corporation’s simulator.

“I am very happy that my challenge to race in IMSA has been officially decided,” Ohta said. “I will make sure that I live up to everyone’s expectations and continue to grow, not only in terms of results, but also for further advancement. I am looking forward to teaming up with the world’s top drivers and competing in the top category.”

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The 25-year-old Honda factory driver started racing in Japanese F4 in 2018, where he spent three full seasons. For the last three years, Ohta has been doing triple duty in Japan by competing in Super Formula, Super GT and Super Taikyu, racking up 11 wins and 13 poles.

“We are delighted that HRS graduate Ohta is taking on the challenge of IMSA, as North American races such as IMSA and IndyCar are truly a global challenge, attracting top-class competitors from all over the world,” noted HRC executive advisor Takuma Sato. “Ohta’s success in Super Formula and Super GT proves that he has the ability to compete on a global level. We sincerely hope that he will take advantage of this opportunity to make further progress. We also hope that his challenge will give hope to many young drivers and help pave the way for them to reach the world stage, and we would like to contribute to the creating such an environment.”

The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship kicks off its 2025 season with the Roar Before the 24 on Jan. 19-21, followed by the Rolex 24 At Daytona on Jan. 23-26.

Bunnell heads to MSR as Ganassi finalizes engineers for new alliance

Chip Ganassi Racing and Meyer Shank Racing have finalized the technical staffing for the Jim Meyer- and Mike Shank-owned NTT IndyCar Series team. In a surprise, former Dale Coyne Racing engineer Ross Bunnell, who joined CGR in 2023 as race engineer …

Chip Ganassi Racing and Meyer Shank Racing have finalized the technical staffing for the Jim Meyer- and Mike Shank-owned NTT IndyCar Series team.

In a surprise, former Dale Coyne Racing engineer Ross Bunnell, who joined CGR in 2023 as race engineer for six-time IndyCar champion Scott Dixon on the No. 9 Honda and is rated by many as one of the brightest engineering talents in the series, has been assigned to MSR with Felix Rosenqvist on the No. 60 Honda.

Dixon and Bunnell earned three wins and placed second in the championship in their first season together, and in 2024, they produced two more wins but slid to sixth in the standings after a rough close to the season.

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Bunnell’s debut with MSR came last Tuesday at The Thermal Club engineering ex-Williams Formula 1 driver Logan Sargeant in the No. 06 MSR Honda. Completing the MSR race engineering group is Angela Ashmore, who worked with Marcus Armstrong at CGR last season, and who signed to drive MSR’s No. 66 Honda.

“Let’s start with Marcus and Angela,” Shank told RACER. “For me, this was one of those things when we knew that we were going to take Marcus on, we worked pretty hard to make sure we kept continuity there. Marcus really likes Angela. I’m just getting to know her, but it seemed to me that it made the most sense, especially if you look at Marcus’s second half of the year, he was really starting to get some momentum. And it made sense to me that we keep as much as that in places we can. Marcus has a lot of confidence in her, and that’s what I need to know.”

Shank was encouraged by what he saw with Bunnell in action.

“Ross is a really good, good guy, and I could tell it by the end of the day at Thermal,” he added. “I could even tell it by the end of the day with Logan with just a lot of similar mentalities to what we have here. I can easily see him working very well with Felix, just the disposition of how Felix is, how Ross is, but also just listening to Ross.

“His confidence and his knowledge of the product just oozes out of him, and that was really good for me to see. Now, ultimately, we’ll see how everyone gets along here. But man, I think it bodes pretty well so far.”

MSR has also appointed Neil Fife, a veteran race engineer who joined the team from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing and worked on MSR’s IMSA GTP program in 2023, as its go-between with CGR.

“That’s an important part for us as the liaison engineer with Ganassi on our side,” Shank said. “He’s making sure everything Ganassi-related to our cars is as it should be. So Neil working with those guys is helpful and Neil will also engineer Helio (Castroneves) when we get to the Speedway.

“We kept him on for special projects after IMSA, and now he moves into this other role, and is also our development guy. Just a humongous amount of experience. Very smart, switched on guy.”

Shank is pleased with how the first outings have gone in the technical alliance with CGR.

“We’d been with Andretti for five years, and it was pretty seamless with them,” he said. “We did that test at the Speedway last month which was our first with Ganassi, and it was very smooth. We had the system down before with Andretti, and it’s headed in the exact same direction with Ganassi.

“We’ve done it a couple times now with Ganassi and they’re taking suggestions on what helps us and we’re asking what we can help on to make things easier for them, and it’s been great. They’re just so practical and easy to deal with, and they brought the full kit of people out for Logan and I couldn’t be more encouraged. They came in with dampers and engineers, we went through lots of things, had a solid pre-run plan that we had worked out, and it’s been great.”

Sargeant on first IndyCar test: ‘Clearly it’s quite a unique car to drive’

Logan Sargeant’s return to open-wheel racing came in a perfect setting on Tuesday at The Thermal Club . The private nature of the test attended by six NTT IndyCar Series teams gave the Floridian a chance to explore a new car in an expectation-free …

Strapped into an unfamiliar Dallara DW12 chassis, at a road course he’d never seen, the 23-year-old former Williams F1 driver was immediately quick, posting the second-fastest lap during the three-hour morning session. He leapt to first in the early afternoon outing, and in the third and final — and fastest — session in the cool desert air, Sargeant finished his maiden IndyCar run in third, 0.192s off of Team Penske’s Felipe Nasr.

Adapting to a heavier car with suboptimal weight distribution and center of gravity figures when compared to the last open-wheeler he drove, a new type of tire, and being tasked with providing chassis and engine feedback to MSR and Honda made for a busy day, but Sargeant was unfazed by the numerous challenges that were presented.

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“It was a good day and clearly it’s quite a unique car to drive — quite different to most of the cars I’ve ever been in in the past,” Sargeant told RACER. “I feel like it’s one of those things you’ve got to work through to understand what the car needs to work with you the best. But nonetheless, we got through a lot of good stuff for the team going into next year. All in all, it was a pretty, pretty clean and solid day, but there’s still plenty more in there.”

The last few years spent on Pirelli rubber in Formula 2 and F1 made learning the driving needs of Firestone’s primary tire one of the bigger takeaways from the test for Sargeant. Thermal’s notoriously high tire degradation rate –significant grip offered by new tires can be lost in less than five laps — only added to the complexities he faced.

“Particularly on the tire, I expected to be able to rag on it a little bit harder, but that clearly wasn’t the case,” he said. “With the amount of weight that’s on the car now, the amount of weight transfer, it’s just quite easy to slide on top of the tire. It becomes quite important to try and keep the tire temperatures under control and even throughout a lap to try and get the most out of it. It’s a tricky one — it’s actually a lot more peaky than I was anticipating going into it and a bit more finicky, but that just means those are things you’ve got to consider and work through.”

Sargeant’s approach was well-received by the MSR crew. Rather than sequester himself inside the upper lounge in MSR’s transporter, he spent Monday outside with the team as they got set up for the test, and again on Tuesday, rarely more than a few feet away from the hub of activity around the car before and after runs.

One team veteran, expecting to receive a distant and aloof F1 driver, was surprised by how normal and approachable Sargeant proved to be. And when it was time to work, it was all business as radio communications and engineering debriefs sounded and looked like any other with leading IndyCar drivers.

With only four seats left to fill, and only one that could offer to pay a professional like Sargeant, his odds of landing on the IndyCar grid next season are remote, but he’d welcome the chance to break into the series in a race seat or as a stand-in if needed.

“If there was an opportunity there to jump into a car, I would definitely do it,” he said. “I had a good time working with the MSR guys; it’s just such a good atmosphere, such a different atmosphere. This was much more enjoyable than the things that I’ve experienced in the past — just easier and a bit more fun to connect with all the people in the team. I had a good time meeting them, working with them and I think that was also felt on the other side. No doubt it was an enjoyable experience.”

Acura MSR team taps IndyCar aces for enduro line-up

Acura Meyer Shank Racing has confirmed that NTT IndyCar Series regulars Scott Dixon, Alex Palou and Felix Rosenqvist will join the GTP team’s roster for the 2025 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona. Four-time …

Four-time Rolex 24 winner Dixon and MSR IndyCar driver Rosenqvist will complete the roster for the No. 60 Acura MSR Acura ARX-06. The pair will join full-season Acura MSR drivers Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun. Rosenqvist will take on Rolex 24 duties in the Acura while Dixon will join Acura MSR for the full endurance schedule.

Coming off back-to-back IndyCar championships, Palou will serve as endurance driver of the No. 93 Acura MSR Acura ARX-06 and pair up with full-season drivers Renger van der Zande and Nick Yelloly.

Dixon has been competing in sportscar endurance competition for 25 years and rounded out the 2024 season and his 50th sports car race with an overall win last month at the Motul Petit Le Mans, co-driving with Acura MSR’s van der Zande.

A familiar face to the MSR family, Rosenqvist will join Acura MSR at Daytona, marking his fourth entry into the historic twice-round-the-clock event as he targets a first Rolex 24 victory.

“It’s really great to see how our IMSA line-up has come together and I think we have some really talented drivers with us this year,” said team co-owner Mike Shank. “Of course it just made sense for Felix to join us at the 24. He’s really proved himself on the IndyCar side of things and I think he can be a big asset to us in IMSA. It’s a no-brainer that Scott knows what he’s doing in the IMSA endurance events and it’s really cool to finally have him come onboard after all these years. Alex is another one who knows what it takes in the GTP category and of course he’s coming off of a big high in IndyCar. I’m excited to see where we shake out in the test this weekend; I think we’re all ready to get going.”

The Acura Meyer Shank Racing squad will head to its first official test at Daytona International Speedway this weekend to prepare for the Rolex 24. Acura MSR will announce its final addition to the No. 93 Acura MSR lineup for the Rolex 24 in the coming weeks.

Shank pleased with first Acura GTP outing

Mike Shank sounded whole for the first time in just over a year. On Monday and Tuesday at Sebring International Raceway, 12 months and 21 days after its last IMSA action, Meyer Shank Racing made its return to IMSA’s WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, a series it never wanted to leave, in a private test that held great significance for Shank and co-owner Jim Meyer.

MSR won on its last time out, taking victory at Motul Petit Le Mans on Oct. 14, 2023. After the checkered flag waved, MSR handed off its factory Acura ARX-06 hybrid GTPs to Wayne Taylor Racing, ending 20 years of continuous participation in Grand Am Rolex Series and IMSA competition. But with WTR’s recent departure from Acura at the end of the most recent running of Petit Le Mans and a reversal of fortune — WTR handing Acuras back to MSR after the race — as Honda Racing Corporation US re-signed MSR brand’s lone manufacturer team in 2025, a sense of normalcy and order was restored.

“It was really, really great,” Shank told RACER. “We purposely left it low key; we didn’t invite anybody to come see it because we just wanted to get our stuff back together. It’s the first outing for the whole group, working together, 90 people there between HRC and MSR, and we ran through so much stuff.”

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The test was the first of its kind for MSR and HRC. In previous factory Acura IMSA DPi and GTP programs, HRC relied on its partner teams to run its cars with full and dedicated engineering staffs supplied by the WTRs and MSRs. But under the new arrangement with MSR, the Ohio-based team will supply crew and engineers for its No. 60 ARX-06, and with the No. 93 ARX-06, MSR is responsible for the mechanical side — the crew looking after all aspects of preparing and fielding the car — while HRC brings its own engineers to handle the performance side of operating the No. 93.

At Sebring, the blended team took its first steps in running cars together — including the shaking down of a new ARX-06 chassis — in preparation for next week’s visit to Daytona International Speedway for a three-day Balance of Performance test led by IMSA to set the technical specification for each WeatherTech Championship model for January’s Rolex 24 At Daytona.

“One car was new, and we have three running cars currently,” Shank said. “It was just a good day for everyone to get to know each other and get the communication channels going, which is really good. I was just really, really pleased with it. You know, we’re only a few weeks after Petit, just got the cars, and it was a Herculean effort to get ready for Sebring, which went really well. So the idea was that we get this together now to be ready for Daytona test, and hopefully, get back there in January with guns blazing and being able to hit that pretty hard.”

The MSR team was a big part of helping HRC and Acura to prepare the ARX-06 for its debut in 2023 and was the manufacturer’s most competitive team. Having missed the second season of GTP action, where all of the cars took major steps forward, Shank was concerned about having a large learning curve to overcome when the factory deal came back to MSR, but after two days at Sebring, those fears have been allayed.

“Actually, it felt very familiar,” he said. “We engaged my top five or six technical people who started working on the project five or six months ago, and we were kind of brought into the loop of where Acura was at, currently. So when we hit the ground running, we had a bunch of systems in place. It wasn’t as big of a shock to the system as I suspected it might be. All due credit to the new head of engineering for me, Vincent Forges — a guy that’s been with me for nine years. He really is just taking this program on our side of it and making sure that we were ready to roll, technically.

“The integration with HRC, with both cars, it’s been really interesting. It’s a new kind of model and we’re learning as we go. But it doesn’t feel like we missed a whole year. I know that sounds arrogant, but we hit the ground running. We had a lot of on-track time, the cars ran fine, virtually no issues. And, man, I was super proud of what everybody did.”