With a series of late yellows negating any strategy, victory in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Cadillac came down to pace in the final hour, which Louis Deletraz and the No. 40 Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-06 had enough. In the …
With a series of late yellows negating any strategy, victory in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Cadillac came down to pace in the final hour, which Louis Deletraz and the No. 40 Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-06 had enough. In the final hour, he passed Felipe Nasr in the No. 7 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963 and, in a battle royale, Sebastien Bourdais in the No. 01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R to claim victory for himself, Jordan Taylor and Colton Herta.
The No. 1 Cadillac of Bourdais, Renger van der Zande and Scott Dixon was second, with Nasr, Dane Cameron and Matt Campbell third.
Era Racing, after a winless season in 2023, opened 2024 with victory in the 36 Hours of Florida, claiming wins at both the Rolex 24 at Daytona and now Sebring. Strategy after an early puncture and great pace got them to the front as Connor Zilisch closed out a victory for himself, Dwight Merriman and Ryan Dalziel.
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In less than a lap, Jack Hawksworth battled from third to the lead in the No. 14 Lexus RC F GT3 he shared with Ben Barnicoat and Kyle Kirkwood to claim a GTD PRO victory for the Vasser Sullivan Racing squad — a nice recovery from a disastrous Rolex 24 that saw them out of the race early. The defending champion had to get by Daniel Juncadella in the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Z06 GT3.R and then Daniel Serra in the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 296 GT3 within several corners. Serra, Davide Rigon and James Calado were second. A late-race battle between Juncadella and Laurin Heinrich in the No. 77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R sent Juncadella off track and out of the race, while Heinrich would receive a drive-through penalty, handing third to the Iron Lynx Lamborghini squad of Mirko Bortolotti, Jordan Pepper and Frank Perera.
There were two 36 Hours of Florida winners this year, as Winward Racing controlled GTD for most of the race. The No. 57 Mercedes AMG and drivers Russell Ward, Philip Ellis and Indy Dontje were near flawless all race to claim their second victory of the season. The No. 47 Cetilar Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 of Roberto Lacorte, Antonio Fuoco and Giorgio Sernagiotto were second, coming oh-so-close to following up Cetilar’s 2022 victory in the race. Elliot Skeer, Adam Adelson and Jan Heylen brought the No. 120 Wright Motorsports Porsche home third.
Halfway at the Rolex 24 at Daytona. The eery stillness of full course yellow reared its ugly head once again for the bulk of the twelfth hour, this time at the hands of yet more drama for Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport. Just over 20 …
Halfway at the Rolex 24 at Daytona. The eery stillness of full course yellow reared its ugly head once again for the bulk of the twelfth hour, this time at the hands of yet more drama for Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport.
Just over 20 minutes into the hour, the circuit drew quiet for heaps of debris on track near Turn 5, potentially from the No. 40 Acura of Louis Deletraz, ceasing Jack Aitken’s deft use of traffic to keep Dane Cameron’s Porsche 963 1.2s behind the Whelen Cadillac not long after Aitken executed a masterful pass for the overall lead.
Come time for the pits to open for leaders, the Rahal Letterman Lanigan BMW team made good use of the unseasonably warm weather, taking no tires are firing both cars away ahead of the two Penske Porsches, relegating Cameron and teammate Laurens Vanthoor to P4 and P5 respectively. WTR swapped a new nose onto the No. 40 before a spot of drama as the No. 78 GTD Lamborghini attempted to leave pitlane with the fuel hose still attached, causing a small fire which was mercifully brief but would eventually yield a penalty for leaving the box with equipment still attached.
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Green returned with just 15 minutes remaining before half distance, the threatening rain having still not arrived. Almost instantly, Vanthoor muscled back past both RLL BMWs to move back to second overall.
The action lasted only briefly, though. Only minutes later WTR’s woes returned once again in almost the same manner suffered earlier by the No. 10 Acura. As Deletraz approached the infield exit, the No. 40 went dark and coasted to a stop, bringing a full course yellow out once again. Oddly, Deletraz managed to restart the car minutes later while the AMR Safety Team attended and made his way, at speed, back around the field readying to claw time back.
Post pit cycle, Tom Dillman now leads LMP2 in the No. 52 ORECA ahead of Connor Zilisch (No. 18) and Malthe Jakobsen (No. 04) with previous leader Ben Keating having slid to fifth in class.
Alessandro Pier Guidi remains in the GTD PRO lead in the No. 62 Risi Ferrari with Alexander Sims still stalking just 1.5s behind.
GTD is led by Frederik Schandorff in the No. 70 McLaren 720S Evo.
Two caution periods and multiple severely damaged cars, including a top GTD PRO contender, have been the signature of the opening hour of the 62nd Rolex 24 at Daytona, with the first hour ending under yellow. Ricky Taylor leads after the No. 10 …
Two caution periods and multiple severely damaged cars, including a top GTD PRO contender, have been the signature of the opening hour of the 62nd Rolex 24 at Daytona, with the first hour ending under yellow. Ricky Taylor leads after the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti crew didn’t give the Acura ARX-06 a full load of energy in order to gain track position when everyone stopped during the first caution.
That yellow came 26 minutes into the race when Misha Goikhberg lost the GTD No. 78 Forte Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo2 on the entry into the Le Mans Chicane, impacting the tire wall on drivers’ left with the right side of the car. Goikhberg was evaluated and released from the care center. The team is working on the car, but it will require extensive repair.
Caution number two came after multiple incidents following the restart. The first involved three LMP2 cars in the Le Mans Chicane — Steven Thomas in the No. 11 TDS Racing ORECA went inside PJ Hyett in the No. 99 AO Racing ORECA, they made contact and spun, and were joined by Dwight Merriman in the No. 18 Era Motorsport ORECA, who perhaps spun in avoidance. All three cars continued.
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The second incident was more serious, with Dennis Andersen spinning the No. 20 High Class Racing ORECA LMP2 car in Turn 2, leaving Mike Conway, who had just taken over the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3, nowhere to go. The Lexus made heavy contact with the LMP2, damaging the radiator in shades of the car’s exit from Motul Petit Le Mans last October. Conway didn’t make it around to the pits and the Lexus had to be taken back to the garage on a rollback. Conway was evaluated and cleared from the care center.
HEARTBREAK for the defending GTD Pro champions.
The @VasserSullivan 14 car was involved in this incident in the opening hour of the #Rolex24.
AWA’s No. 13 Corvette has struck mechanical trouble, first not starting as cars rolled out for the pace laps, then making multiple trips to the pits before Orey Fidani finally took the car to the garage. A fuel pump is one of the suspected issues, but there are others as well, and the car was in the garage as the first hour ended.
Daniel Serra was making a charge to the front of the GTD PRO field in the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 296 GT3, but had a long stop due to an issue with the air jacks and now has 27 cars separating the Ferrari from the front.
With just over an hour to go in the Motul Petit Le Mans, the championship fight appears to be over. With the two primary contenders left in the race running second and third behind Renger van der Zande in the No. 01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R, it …
With just over an hour to go in the Motul Petit Le Mans, the championship fight appears to be over. With the two primary contenders left in the race running second and third behind Renger van der Zande in the No. 01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R, it was shaping up to be a replay of 2021 between Whelen Engineering Cadillac Racing and Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport.
Pipo Derani in the No. 31 Cadillac was leading Filipe Albuquerque in the No. 10 Acura. Heading into Turn 1, Albuquerque juked left to pass, got alongside Derani, but was running out of room at the exit. Minor contact between the two cars sealed Albuquerque’s fate, and the Acura sailed off track and into the tire barrier, finished for the event. Albuquerque was transported to a local hospital for evaluation.
The pain exhibited on team principal Wayne Taylor’s face was palpable as the team lost its fourth championship in a row after coming into the finale in a virtual dead heat.
Race control deemed the crash a racing incident and took no action. Derani and Alexander Sims will claim the championship for Whelen Engineering as long as they finish ahead of or within three positions of the No. 25 BMW M Team RLL M Hybrid V8.
On a wet-but-drying track with conditions improving constantly throughout qualifying for the Motul Petit Le Mans, being last under the checkered flag proved to be an advantage in many cases. That was, until GTP, the final of the three qualifying …
On a wet-but-drying track with conditions improving constantly throughout qualifying for the Motul Petit Le Mans, being last under the checkered flag proved to be an advantage in many cases. That was, until GTP, the final of the three qualifying sessions, began. Heavy mist started falling after a dramatic finish to LMP2/LMP3 qualifying that saw Ben Keating set the fastest time overall in an LMP2 car, leading to worsening conditions as the GTP cars rolled out.
Conditions worsened during the first half of the 20-minute GTP qualifying session for Saturday’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race, forcing cars that had started the session on slicks to quickly switch to wet tires. But then conditions improved a bit during the second half, and times started tumbling, with the polesitter constantly shifting as the times fell.
Louis Deletraz, the endurance addition for the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport Acura ARX-06, drew qualifying for the team, and on his second set of wet tires, with only one lap to do it, took the GTP pole with a time of 1m15.402s, nearly 6s slower than the top times of the weekend.
“It was very tough,” Deletraz explained after his first career WeatherTech Championship pole. “I hoped for dry qualy, to be honest, because we were fast in the dry. I think we have a strong car here, and obviously it’s always easier [when it’s dry]. We tried to go out on slicks and it was definitely too slippery; I couldn’t put energy into the tires, couldn’t commit, and I think some drivers are much better than me at that, but I didn’t want to take risk to crash the car. Then on the wets we felt strong. I think we might have pitted a little early compared to some others. We reacted to that…so I feel good.”
While taking the pole moved the No. 10 to the top of the points standings in the extremely close battle for the championship, it won’t likely change how the team needs to finish for Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque to take the title. However, putting three cars between the No. 10 and the next championship contender, the No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963 qualified in fifth by Nick Tandy, may have an effect in the race. Connor De Phillippi qualified the long-shot No. 25 BMW M Team RLL M Hybrid V8 in sixth, and erstwhile points leader Pipo Derani ended up eighth in the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac Racing V-Series.R.
“Wayne Taylor Racing told me I was going to qualify this weekend and I’m always happy to do it; but a little pressure because we’re fighting for a championship, and it’s a big show of trust from them. I’m always going into qualy with the aim of fighting for a pole, but of course when it’s your first one you never really expect it and I’m super happy for what we achieved. It’s good for the championship, good for me, good for everyone,” said Deletraz, who becomes a full-time driver for the team next season alongside Jordan Taylor.
In between the No. 10 and the other championship contenders was Sebastien Bourdais, who had been near the top of the time sheets all weekend and turned a 1m15.632s lap to start the No. 01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R on the outside of the front row. (Despite the GTP cars qualifying behind many of the LMP2 cars, and even some LMP3 machines, they will still be gridded first for the race). Augusto Farfus in the No. 24 BMW, one of the first cars to go onto wet tires, will start on the inside of the second row after a 1m15.731s lap, with Tom Blomqvist in the No. 60 Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura alongside.
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LMP2 qualifying could play a critical role in the championship, as the order the two championship contenders qualified in could determine where each needed to finish relative to the other to win the championship. Ben Keating scored the pole position of his life by only 0.02s to claim the LMP2 pole ahead of chief championship rival Stephen Thomas. Perhaps more important than the pole is the three-point gain that came with it. That changes the number of positions that Keating and the No. 52 PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA squad must finish ahead of Thomas’s No. 11 TDS Racing squad. Keating and co-driver Paul-Loup Chatin now have a 17-point deficit to Thomas and Mikkel Jensen in the season points championship.
The LMP2 and LMP3 session had the best conditions of the three, and Keating, beginning his final lap having qualified second to Thomas so far, posted a 1m13.859s time as he went under the checker to steal the pole from Thomas by 0.02s.
“We were the first group to go out on slicks, which was the right call, but it was still sketchy,” Keating said. “It’s hard to put heat in the tires on that particular track and you don’t know which curbs you can touch and which ones you can’t. You have to work your way up to it and I did what I thought was a really, really good lap.
“Right there in the second lap before the end, they came on the radio and told me that Steven was 0.25s faster than I was, and I only had one lap to do it. Coming down the back straightaway and my predictive [timing] said I only had 0.1s better than my previous time. I knew I didn’t have enough to get the pole and I had nothing to lose … I took a ton of risk, completely sent it across [Turns] 10A and 10B, and pulled it off. So it was pretty magical to get it in that way. And now I hope that the championship comes down to that to that qualifying.”
John Falb qualified the No. 35 TDS Racing ORECA in third with a 1m14.380s. George Kurtz, who has a far-outside shot at the championship with Ben Hanley but is leading the Michelin Endurance Cup points, will start fourth.
Glenn van Berlo, whose qualifying session included a wild wide through the grass at Turn 3, took the LMP3 pole for Andretti Autosport, turning a 1m16.371s lap in the No. 36 Ligier. Rasmus Lindh put the No. 85 AWA Duqueine second after falling 0.129s short of van Berlo’s best. Freshly minted VP Racing SportsCar Challenge LMP3 champion Bijoy Garg qualified the No. 30 Jr III Racing Ligier third, followed by Orey Fidany in the No. 13 AWA Duqueine.
Jake Galstad/Lumen
With light rain having been falling since the end of the Michelin Pilot Challenge race, Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta was wet, but drying when the GTD cars took to the track for the first qualifying session. Ian James and the Heart of Racing crew rolled the dice, threw on slicks, and saw their gamble pay off with an overall pole position among the GT cars.
“I decided to go for slicks there, one of the few cars that did, so that lent heavily to the result here,” explained Heart of Racing principal James, who steps in as the endurance addition in the No 27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3. “But in the twilight of my career, it’s just fun to get out there and and have a chance. To get pole here is actually pretty special because it was pretty dicey the first few laps not to crash, but they got faster and faster.
“This Heart of Racing program, it means a lot to me. Exciting news this week and we had some good results for our female program last weekend. Let’s keep the momentum going,” he continued, referencing Aston Martin coming to GTP and Hypercar in 2025 with HoR.
James’s 1m23.116s lap was only 0.052s quicker than GTD PRO polesitter Jack Hawksworth in the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus, which will start outside the front row alongside the Heart of Racing Aston.
“It was that situation where the tracks damp, but it’s going to dry and we have to make a decision to go with wets, to go with slicks, and it turned out slicks was was the right decision,” said Hawksworth, who won Petit Le Mans last year with Ben Barnicoat and Kyle Kirkwood. “Fortunately for us there was only one car in the PRO GT field that went with the slicks. From there it really was just about managing the tire because the track was getting better every lap, but obviously the the wet tires, they get hot and overheat. You would push for a lap and then cool down for two laps, push again for a lap to try and keep the tire there so you’ve always got a time on the board, but once the track’s getting better, you can still post another one. Managing it was quite tricky, but the car was amazing.”
Mirko Bortolotti would have been on the inside of the second row in the GTD PRO Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 2, but he left the pit box too early, the penalty for which is all times lost and the No. 63 will start at the back. Instead it was the sister Lamborghini qualifying third overall and second in GTD as Doriane Pin claimed the spot for the Iron Dames with a 1m23.168s. GTD cars took the next two spots, and the two Vasser Sullivan Lexuses will line up nose to tail after Aaron Telitz qualified the No. 12 fourth overall, followed by Bill Auberlen in the No. 97 Turner Motorsport BMW M4 GT3.
Antonio Garcia was the second-quick qualifier in GTD PRO, turning a 1m24.099s lap in the No. 3 Corvette Racing C8.R, and will start sixth. The fourth row will be a pair of Mercedes AMGs, Philip Ellis putting the No. 57 Winward Racing fifth in GTD and will start on the inside of the fourth row, with third-quick GTD PRO qualifier Jules Gounon in the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Mercedes AMG alongside. The fifth row will be a pair of GTD PRO cars, Patrick Pilet in the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R and Daniel Serra in the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 296 GT3.
Up Next: An 20-minute warmup at 8:45 a.m. ahead of an 11:40 a.m. race start for the 10-hour Motul Petit Le Mans.
Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport is making headway on its upcoming expansion to fielding two Acura ARX-06 GTP cars on behalf of the Japanese auto manufacturer. WTR w/AA’s current No. 10 Acura entry will be joined by a new ARX-06 for 2024, …
Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport is making headway on its upcoming expansion to fielding two Acura ARX-06 GTP cars on behalf of the Japanese auto manufacturer.
WTR w/AA’s current No. 10 Acura entry will be joined by a new ARX-06 for 2024, and according to Andretti COO Rob Edwards, the internal staffing and external recruitment efforts required to build out the second-car team is making significant progress,
“We actually we all sat down at Long Beach, the guys at Wayne Taylor Racing, ourselves, and Honda Performance Development, to put together an organizational plan and we’ve been hiring since then when the right people have come along,” Edwards told RACER. “We’re looking at a mix of new people and internal staff for the second car project.
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“I think it’ll end up being a combination of some people that are in sports car already, maybe some people that are currently on either on our IndyCar program or the Indy NXT next program — people within the family. And the goal is to have at least a majority of the team in place by September.”
With all of the heightened technology and complexity within a hybrid GTP car, the recruitment process for a new effort is extensive.
“It’s not a hard number, but as a guideline, we’re looking to assemble probably 15 to 17 people for the car,” Edwards said. “We’re going to be very closely engaged with HPD on some of the engineering sides, so that number may drift depending upon how we decide to share responsibilities on some of the engineering topics. The really fun and cool thing is the cars are sophisticated, but that does also mean that you can’t run one with just a handful of people.”
Following Andretti’s investment into WTR at the beginning of the season, the single-car effort with the No. 10 Acura has been run by WTR without significant operational changes. But with the onboarding of a sister entry to facilitate, Edwards says the project represents the first major collaborative item for the two sides to develop from scratch.
“It’s been fun,” he said. “The main people like [WTR GM] Travis Hogue and myself, and then [WTR technical director] Brian Pillar and our technical director Eric Bretzman, we’ve all found a lot of commonalities in our outlook in assembling this new car program when we when we look at people and we interview people.
“Eric and I are also adopting the approach that they’ve been super-successful in sports cars, and we don’t want to come in and change that culture. We just want to be additive to it. So early in the interview process, all four of us interviewed two or three people just to benchmark views, if you will, so that if not all four of us could talk to someone, or the or the pace of hiring had to ramp up, that we’d all calibrate what we were looking for. And that was a really good experience.
“It’s the early stages of this process overall, but it’s been enjoyable to engage with Brian and Travis and for Eric and I to talk to some different folks who usually than we normally talk to, and try and take the best from both teams to build what needs to be built.”
Acura Motorsports and Honda Performance Development will expand their presence in 2024 with partner team Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport by adding a second Acura ARX-06 GTP entry to its IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP stable. …
Acura Motorsports and Honda Performance Development will expand their presence in 2024 with partner team Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport by adding a second Acura ARX-06 GTP entry to its IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP stable.
The move, which was expected after Michael Andretti expressed the desire to field a second car in a January interview with RACER, bolsters the GTP field which is expected to have more factory and customer entries on next year’s grid with the arrival of Lamborghini and additional sales of Porsche’s 963.
For the WTR/AA outfit, the strengthened relationship with Acura and HPD will lead to a workforce expansion to run a second 2.4-liter twin-turbo V6-powered prototype and the need to hire more drivers to helm the entry that will run alongside its No. 10 ARX-06 piloted by Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque. Numerous drivers are known to have inquired about the opportunity which should lead to a stampede of interest for the brand and team.
The relationship between Acura and WTR got off to a perfect start in 2021 when the team delivered the manufacturer’s first overall win at the Rolex 24 At Daytona and went on to win two more races on the way to a runner-up finish in the DPi Drivers’ and Teams’ standings.
WTR was the most dominant DPi team of 2022, earning four wins on the way to placing second in the championship behind fellow Acura factory team Meyer Shank Racing. Joined by Andretti Autosport in 2023, the new union finished second at the Rolex 24 and currently holds third in the GTP championship.
