Acura, Porsche Clinch Manufacturer Titles at Race Start

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

Acura and Porsche have clinched the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship DPi and GT Le Mans class titles with their cars rolling off the grid in Saturday’s season-ending Motul Petit Le Mans.

Additionally, Meyer Shank Racing has wrapped up the GT Daytona teams’ title with Justin Marks taking the No. 86 Acura NSX GT3 Evo on to the formation lap.

Marks’ co-drivers Trent Hindman and Mario Farnbacher will claim the GTD drivers’ championship once one of the drivers hits the two-hour and 30-minute minimum drive time.

It will be the same for LMP2 points leader Matt McMurry in the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Oreca 07 Gibson.

It has marked Acura’s fifth manufacturers’ championship in eight seasons of both IMSA and American Le Mans Series competition and is first with the Acura Team Penske operation, now in its second year.

Porsche, meanwhile, has earned its third GTLM manufacturers title in the last six years, and its first since 2015.

Additional titles still to play in for in today’s ten-hour enduro include the DPi drivers’ championship, which sees Dane Cameron and Juan Pablo Montoya with a 12-point lead, the same margin between Porsche GT Team’s Laurens Vanthoor and Earl Bamber and the sister No. 911 entry of Nick Tandy and Patrick Pilet in GTLM.

Only a single point, meanwhile, separates Lamborghini from Acura in the GTD manufacturers’ championship. 

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John