BMW Confirms Rahal GTP Split At End of Season

Photo: Mike Levitt/IMSA

BMW has confirmed that it will end its factory partnership in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP class with Rahal Letterman Lanigan at the conclusion of the season.

Confirmation from the German manufacturer comes after a media report from RACER revealed that the Bobby Rahal co-owned organization has not been retained for the 2026 GTP season.

Team RLL, which has run BMW’s factory sports car programs in North America since 2009, could, however, still be utilized for other motorsports-related activities, according to a spokesperson from the Munich brand.

The Indianapolis-based team currently operates BMW of North America’s historic racing activation program and is also the North American customer racing parts and service provider for the brand.

“At the moment we cannot announce our program for 2026 because there are internal processes at BMW that make it necessary for us to wait,” a statement by BMW provided to Sportscar365 read.

“We can confirm that we end the GTP program with Rahal after this season. But there are different options where we are still working together and we want to keep on working together.

“[Team RLL] is also doing the [BMW] Classic program for BMW of North America and they’re also doing the [North America] parts truck and all that stuff.

“We don’t want to completely end the collaboration. We’ll try to find solutions.”

The GTP split comes after continued struggles with the factory program in the WeatherTech Championship since its debut in 2023, which has so far resulted in only two wins, highlighted by a 1-2 finish in last year’s Battle on the Bricks at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

RLL underwent a significant shakeup this year, both in drivers and team personnel, which has seen pole-winning efforts from Dries Vanthoor, who along with Sheldon van der Linde, have been pulling double duty in both the WeatherTech Championship and FIA World Endurance Championship.

Rumors linking Team WRT, which operates BMW’s factory Hypercar program in the WEC, to taking over the WeatherTech Championship effort, in a potential scaled back Michelin Endurance Cup-only program, have not been confirmed.

Speaking with Sportscar365 at Interlagos, site of this weekend’s WEC 6 Hours of Sao Paulo, WRT team principal Vincent Vosse admitted he was aware of Rahal’s situation and has expressed his continued interest to expand his team’s efforts to North America.

“I will not say it’s not something I did not know,” Vosse said of the Rahal situation. “I’m still saying that I would be interested, as a team, like every team would be interested.

“The rest is not in my hands and not for me to comment.”

BMW M Motorsport director Andreas Roos is not on-site in Brazil this weekend and was unavailable for immediate comment.

The manufacturer has not yet finalized its participation in the GTP class for the WeatherTech Championship next year, with at least one other top-class OEM understood to be in a similar situation.

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