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Max Verstappen's GT Crossover Is Here, and All That Comes With It

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Max Verstappen will make his debut at arguably the most brutal endurance race on the planet this weekend at the ADAC Ravenol 24h Nürburgring, serving as a truly remarkable motorsport crossover event that may just be the biggest in history. Max's presence at the 24 has drawn a record-breaking, sold-out crowd for the first time in its history. Verstappen himself has slowly and patiently built to a point where something like this could become reality, and as a four-time Formula 1 world champion, his passions for racing go beyond the (alleged) Pinnacle of Motorsports. He is finally able to take on the Nürburgring Nordschleif and mark it off his career checklist as he comes ready to fight with a seriously stacked stable of co-drivers and a Mercedes-AMG GT3 Verstappen Racing machine capable of fighting for the overall victory. Dani Juncadella, Jules Gounon and Lucas Auer  will split duties with Verstappen as one of the whopping 41 total entries in the SP9 class. For those that know the G...
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WTR's Struggles Continue with Rock Bottom (?) Outing At Laguna Seca

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What exactly does Wayne Taylor Racing need to do in this day and age to right all of their wrongs? Honestly, who really knows. (End of article). No we kid. But seriously - will someone or something please come to the rescue of the WTR/Cadillac 2.0 partnership? With the conclusion of the Monterey SportsCar Championship round at Laguna Seca, we've seemingly never been further away from seeing WTR and their dual-entry Cadillac's secure their first race victory with the V-Series.R, which would also serve as their first win of any kind racing prototypes since the mid-point of the 2024 season when the No. 10 ARX-06 won on the streets of Detroit - 704 days ago. Laguna began with split-promise between the No. 40 and the No. 10 as Louis Deletraz managed to put the 40 on pole after capitalizing on the stellar pace the car showed through two rounds of practice beforehand. The No. 10 had a more sluggish Friday/Saturday after Filipe Albuquerque ran the sister car off the track when attempti...
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Earl Bamber Takes No Issues With Late-Race Contact From Heinrich

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Coming off the stellar late-race battle when he and Laurin Heinrich locked horns at Laguna Seca with just about five minutes to go, Earl Bamber took no issues with the contact that ensued on the back of his Cadillac when Heinrich clipped the left rear when attempting a pass going into turn 3.  The contact occurred on the second-to-last lap of the race, leaving Bamber to nurse the rubbing tire while also having to navigate batches of GT traffic, opening the door for Heinrich to make the final pass on the white flag lap heading through turn 4. Post-race, Bamber had no issues with the tough racing that resulted in the slight damage on his No. 31, simplifying the end result as Heinrich coming on like a speed demon equipped with healthier tires in the closing minutes.   "With about 10 laps to go, the (No.) 5 just appeared out of nowhere and when I heard it was coming at half of a second a lap, I knew it was going to be tough to hold him off,”  said Bamber. “I got a couple...
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Laurin Heinrich Builds On His Already Stellar Resume with GTP Triumph

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Sunday at Laguna Seca produced one of the great moments ever in IMSA competition when wunder-talent Laurin Heinrich outdueled Earl Bamber late in the game to deliver the first-ever victory for a privateer team in the new GTP era. The race itself was fantastic front-to-back, capstoned by the amazing duel between Bamber in the Whelen Cadillac and Heinrich in the JDC-Miller Motorsports Porsche 963 in the final stages of the race. After the final cycles of pit stops were complete and no late caution flag came, the rotation of front-running GTP teams saw the #31, #5 and the #25 BMW driven by Marco Wittman emerge as podium candidates. Heinrich actually had come out of the pits behind Wittman on track, leaving him needing to also dispatch of the BMW before setting his sights on the No. 31. The ensuing battle between Heinrich and Bamber produced one of the better moments in IMSA's long history, although it came with the unfortunate contact that Heinrich delivered to the back left of the Ca...
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McLaren, Genesis Both Postpone Their IMSA Arrivals - Again

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Coming on the heels of Acura announcing that they're ending their prototype support in IMSA after years of participation, we've gotten a double-dose of non-committal reassessments of the future for two incoming (we think??) manufacturers' - McLaren and Genesis. In separate news drops that happened to come just days apart from each other, the potential arrival of both of those brands to North America has now become even cloudier, with the program director heads for both programs - Cyril Abiteboul of Genesis and Zak Brown of McLaren - stating, quite frankly, that given all current and future circumstances, the debuts of their respective brands to the WeatherTech Championship series is simply not coming anytime soon. Starting with Genesis, Abiteboul told SportsCar365.com that along with all of the other logistical and R&D obstacles that come with properly building out a racing program from the ground-up, the delay to the 2026 World Endurance Championship season could see ...
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Acura's Departure From IMSA Another Dent To the Platinum Era

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The shelf life of brands, cars and prototype projects in the world of international competitive motorsports usually mirrors that of the bananas at your local grocery store, and we've been dealt another blow to the 'Platinum Era' of racing in IMSA with the news of Acura's GTP departure at the end of this season. In a reshuffling of their racing portfolio to focus more resources to their IndyCar efforts, Honda Racing Corporation USA announced on Wednesday that they're taking essentially the same short-term, PR-positive approach that other brands have recently taken i.e. Lamborghini, Porsche and Alpine with a "pausing" of their participation in the WeatherTech Championship series with their pair of ARX-06 LMDh machines. Meyer Shank Racing are willing participants in the change of plans, as they'll see the increased support from Honda/Acura directly impact and boost-up their IndyCar efforts in 2027 and beyond. But remember - this is just a 'pause' ...
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GT World Challenge America Absolutely Deserves Your Attention In 2026

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The new season of the American division of SRO competition kicks off this weekend at Sonoma Raceway in California and if you spare us a minute of your time we'll explain how the entire weekend, highlighted by GT World Challenge America, is absolutely worth your time.  SRO and their branch of worldwide operations is objectively a great product in the motorsports world, and it's about time we really put the spotlight on what Stéphane Ratel and Co. have put together for the American side of things and what they've built over the last 20 years. A lot of you (I'm sure) already follow and watch the GT World Challenge Europe season and all of the teams, drivers and tracks that come with it. The last handful of years has seen GT World America elevate their game to new heights, and although it is nowhere near what GTWE produces yet at this point in time, it is set for a huge explosion in the 2026 season.  Let's get into four key aspects of what makes the new season so intrig...
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Random Vandals' WeatherTech Debut No Longer Planned For 2026

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In a reversal from what was previously reported a few months ago, the Random Vandals Racing team will in fact not enter the IMSA WeatherTech Championship series in 2026. SportsCar365.com reported that Vandals team president Paul Sparta has reversed course on his previous ambitions to enter into the GTD Pro class in 2026, while adding that a single-car entry to the Michelin Pilot Challenge is the new focus for a team coming off multiple titles in the 2025 SRO season to the tune of a Pro championship in GT World Challenge America and dual titles in Pirelli GT4 America. Sparta added that the the potential entry into the Michelin Pilot Challenge series with a BMW M4 GT4 could come quite late on in the season, so late in fact that they're currently targeting the season-finale at Petit Le Mans next October. The Vandals will continue their presence in the SRO ranks in 2026 so they aren't going anyplace that we won't be able to see them compete. They came on in a huge way as Kento...
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Jensen, McElrea, Thomas Depart TDS Racing After Wildly Successful Run

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Major changes are coming to TDS Racing this offseason as their entire driver lineup is set to turnover following their successful 2025 campaign, according to all three drivers currently in their stable.  Following their victory at Petit Le Mans which delivered TDS their second-consecutive LMP2 Michelin Endurance Cup crown, the trio of Mikkel Jensen, Hunter McElrea and Steven Thomas revealed they will all depart from the team this off-season.  The Bronze-rated Thomas actually let the cat out of the bag himself first during an in-race interview that PLM would be his last event with the team and likely the last for his competitive racing career at this point in time. The news means that the FIA Platinum-rated Jensen is set to hit the free agent driver market, which is a development that's sure to bring a ton of attention to fellow prototype teams hoping to secure his talents for 2026. Jensen has managed to balance the responsibilities of running two full-season campaigns in the ...
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AWA Secure Le Mans Invite, Rebranding To 13 Motorsports For 2026

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Although it didn't play out in the exact competitively-enduring method that they had hoped for in the spirit of competition, AWA will take it nonetheless.  Going into the IMSA finale at Petit Le Mans, the Bob Akin Award was still up for grabs between the No. 13 AWA Corvette and the No. 70 Inception Racing Ferrari, with an automatic invite to Le Mans 2026 on the line. With just the two full-time participants in the season-long battle between GTD teams that run with a Bronze-rated driver, coupled with Inception's victory at the Battle of the Bricks for a huge points haul, the scenario for Saturday's race was simple - whichever car finished ahead of the other would win the Akin Award and thus punch their ticket to Circut de la Sarthe next June. The potential to see a 10-hour battle play out came literally crashing down on the opening lap when Brendon Iribe smacked into the Conquest Ferrari for some Italian-on-Italian manufacturer crime, and in doing so immediately awarded the ...
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End of the Line for Forte Racing In GTD

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Unfortunately the 2025 IMSA season has concluded, and as we now look towards the short off-season we can forecast which teams will be hitting the grid for 2026, and sadly which other teams will not. The initial entry list of confirmed teams dropped by IMSA before the season finale at Petit Le Mans was missing a handful of teams that were on the grid for 2025, and picking just one of those teams out of the bucket for now is Forte Racing.  The No. 78 had a difficult Petit Le Mans when they were caught up in the opening lap wreck that claimed the lives of four GTD machines right off the rip while making the lives difficult for others with sustained damage. Forte were one of those teams, and although they managed to continue on with the race the damage to the front of the car slowed down their pace and put them multiple laps down from the leaders, and it ultimately resulted in a retirement after 280 laps completed and seven-plus hours of racing. In the aftermath, although no word has ...
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Korthoff Competition Motors Pull Out of Road America, Remainder of 2025 Campaign

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After a rocky June and July for Korthoff Competition Motors, all of the ups-and-downs we saw were part of something much larger going on behind the scenes. As teams have loaded into Road America for this weekend's WeatherTech Championship race, it has been confirmed that not only will the No. 32 Korthoff Competition Motors Mercedes-AMG not participate in the race, Dailysportscar.com also confirmed  that the team will not race again this season , although no official comment has come from the team to this point. The GTD squad will miss the last races at Road America, VIR, Indy and Petite Le Mans. Things started to turn sideways once Seth Lucas abruptly departed his full-time seat right before the Six Hour's of the Glen in June. Lucas, along with veteran GT talent Kenton Koch, were originally slated to drive the full-season schedule in the car. The new trio of Koch, Daniel Morad and Mikey Taylor managed to secure a P3 finish for the car, yet on July 5 Koch announced that he was d...
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Past-the-Mid-Season-Mid-Season GTD Pro Recap: Best team, biggest storyline, biggest disappointment

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It's Part II of our Past-the-Mid-Season Mid-Season recap, GTD Pro style. As we head into Road America this weekend the GTD Pro title chase is arguably the best fight we have going on in all of the four WeatherTech classes. Corvette still maintains the lead, but the No. 77 is trying to pull off back-to-back championships while a newcomer is making waves. Let's get into it. Best Team - Corvette Racing By Pratt Miller  The No. 3 sits atop the Pro standings as things stand going into Road America, and the No. 4 currently sit P6 right on the heals of the No. 65 Mustang and No. 48 Paul Miller BMW. The 3 car has been amazingly consistent with four podium finishes in six races, and although an overall victory hasn't come yet, three P2 finishes will go a long way towards keeping your title chances alive as the season goes along. The No. 3 of Antonio Garcia and Alexander Sims have fared much better than the No. 4 duo of Nicky Catsburg and Tommy Milner,, although the duo of Nicky Cats...
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