March 16, 2021 By David Phillips IMSA Wire Service DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – This weekend marks the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s third visit to Sebring International Raceway in nine months, courtesy of a pandemic that saw the 2020 Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts moved from its traditional March date to November and the addition of the one-off Cadillac Grand Prix sprint race in July to last year’s topsy-turvy calendar. But that was then, and this is now. The question is for whom will the third time be a charm? In terms of the overall win, the Daytona Prototype international (DPi) class poses some intriguing questions. The 2021 DPi lineup features plenty of new faces and alliances, what with Wayne Taylor Racing and Meyer Shank with Curb-Agajanian Racing taking over the Acura program from Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing joining JDC-Miller Motorsports and Whelen Engineering Racing in the Cadillac stable for the full season. Meanwhile, Mazda Motorsports downsized to a one-car effort and Action Express expanded what had initially been a Rolex 24 At Daytona-only effort for the No. 48 Cadillac to include the four events in the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup. Surprisingly, perhaps, the Rolex 24 came down to a duel between the relative “newcomers” in WTR’s No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-05 and the No. 01 CGR Cadillac, rather than the “established” programs. Of course, it wasn’t so simple as Action Express’ No. 48 Ally Cadillac and the No. 5 Mustang Sampling Cadillac woulda/coulda been in the hunt for the win but for some mechanical issues and off-track adventures. Will the No. 10 and No. 01 CGR entries be the ones to beat at Sebring or will the other Cadillacs rebound, particularly the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Racing entry which dominated the Sebring sprint race and looked a potential winner in last year’s Twelve Hours. What of the No. 60 Meyer Shank Acura? After a curiously quiet Rolex 24, will the requisite speed be found to challenge for the win at Sebring? And speaking of quiet Rolex 24s, lest we forget Mazda is the defending Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring champion. Don’t count out the No. 55 Mazda DPi this weekend. Will Corvette Racing repeat its convincing 1-2 finish in January’s Rolex 24 in the GT Le Mans class? Maybe. Maybe not. Although the then-new mid-engine Corvette C8.R won Sebring’s July “sprint” race, the punishing circuit had the last laugh of 2020 in the Twelve Hours as both ‘Vettes suffered mechanical issues. And while BMW Team RLL’s BMW M8 GTEs were not quite able to match the Corvette pace at Daytona this year, they were on track to win the 2020 Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring before the lead Bimmer was unceremoniously punted off track on a late restart. Thus, when all the dust and carbon fiber settled, Porsche took home top honors from the 2020 Twelve Hours. This year, of course, sees the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing squad campaigning a lone Porsche 911 RSR (with factory support from Porsche) in place of CORE autosport’s full-on, two-car works effort of recent years. And if BMW Team RLL was cruelly denied a win in the final minutes of last year’s Twelve Hours, the WeatherTech team suffered arguably a worse fate earlier this year when it was rudely belted out of contention at Daytona before the green flag even waved. Will the Corvette C8.R survive a dozen hours of Sebring? Will BMW Team RLL extract its Sebring revenge? Or will the fickle fortunes of racing favor the WeatherTech Porsche this time around? Stay tuned. As was the case at the Rolex 24, Sebring has attracted good fields in both the Le Mans Prototype 2 and 3 (LMP2 and LMP3) categories with the No. 18 Era Motorsport ORECA LMP2 07 looking to repeat its Daytona success; ditto the No. 74 Riley Motorsports Ligier JS P320 in LMP3. Watch out for the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports entry in LMP3, though, since drivers Dan Goldburg and Rasmus Lindh are fresh off a second-place finish last weekend in the IMSA Prototype Challenge race at Sebring in the LMP3-1 class. Finally, what to make of the GT Daytona (GTD) class at Sebring? The Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 that won at Daytona isn’t entered at Sebring. The No. 75 Sun Energy 1 Mercedes that finished second is back, but will Mercedes still possess the advantage in a deeply competitive GTD field? Was that a flash in the pan or a harbinger of things to come? Certainly, the likes of Acura, Aston Martin, Audi, BMW, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Lexus and Porsche will not take those results lying down. |
