Doonan: IMSA “Earned the Right” to Confirm 2025 Schedule Early

Photo: Mike Levitt/IMSA

IMSA President John Doonan said the sanctioning body and its partners have “earned the right” to be in such a strong position to be able to confirm the 2025 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship schedule nearly a half-year earlier than normal.

Both the 2025 WeatherTech Championship and Michelin Pilot Challenge calendars were released Friday morning during a ‘breaking news’ event at Sebring International Raceway, which has provided competitors with a “longer runway” for planning.

IMSA is believed to be the first motorsports sanctioning body worldwide to release its 2025 calendars.

“This entire group in this room and everybody in the paddock, I believed we’ve earned the right to be confident in what we’re doing,” Doonan said.

“That starts with everybody that’s putting the show on. We have some absolutely incredible sports car racing, I’d argue the best in the world, and every single championship that runs with us, every team that’s on the track, we’ve got the best of the best.

“They deserve to have a longer runway for planning.

“Each and every one of these events is inked with our promoter partners. We’re very excited about that. [We have] long-term sanctioning agreements achieved with each and every one of these venues.

“Of course there’s a lot of venue and date equity. But we have a good thing going and when it’s not broke, you don’t fix it.”

Speaking to reporters after the historic announcement, Doonan stressed the importance of stability within the organization that has made the schedule confirmations possible this early into the year.

“We’re super excited about the fact that we were able to put it all together, utilizing a pillar event like Sebring to make the announcement,” he said.

“It works because we’ve got stability with the promoter partners. It works because you have stability with your television broadcast partner. It works because we have teams that have put their plans together early.

“I think the fact that we were able to open the registration portal as early as we did last year and get people locked in, it just creates a better platform for everyone.”

When asked by Sportscar365 if he’s hopeful that its 2025 schedule announcement, coming in mid-March, would help alleviate potential clashing events with other endurance races or series, Doonan said they continue to communicate with fellow organizers on that matter.

This year’s WeatherTech Championship schedule has three clashing weekends with the FIA World Endurance Championship as well as the Nürburgring 24, while IMSA moved its Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen one week forward to prevent a clash with the CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa.

The 2025 Watkins Glen round has returned to its traditional late June date after what was announced as a one-time change.

“We’ve always tried to be a good citizen with our partners at the ACO/WEC, with SRO, with IndyCar, with our home team at NASCAR,” Doonan said.

“We talked to everybody in advance and gave them a heads up of what we were announcing today.

“I’m really just excited about the fact that we can get it out early and it gives everybody a chance to plan far in advance.”

Doonan: IMSA “Super Sensitive” to Teams’ Operating Budgets

Next year’s round at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park will again be a LMP2 feature race with GTD Pro and GTD classes, meaning that GTP cars will not be making the trip back North of the Border until 2026 at the earliest.

Doonan indicated this was largely for cost reasons, citing the additional Michelin Endurance Cup race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway as one of the factors.

“We’re super sensitive to race team budgets,”he said. “Adding a fifth Michelin Endurance Cup event is more running time, it’s more tires, it’s more fuel, it’s more time on the cars, so we’re real sensitive to just adding events and adding more time.

“For the time being, we’re going to stick with what we have here and we’ll watch it and monitor it with the race teams. But we’re comfortable with what we have.”

When asked about the future of IMSA at Lime Rock Park, which does not feature on the schedule for what will be the second consecutive year, Doonan expressed interest in the sanctioning body returning to the historic Connecticut circuit in the future.

IMSA has yet to announce its full slate of 2025 schedules for its sanctioned single-make series, as well as VP Racing SportsCar Challenge.

“We’re continuing to talk to the team at Lime Rock about bringing IMSA back there,” Doonan said. “We have great history there.

“In whatever form we go back in, IMSA and Lime Rock have a long-standing tradition and I hope we can continue that for years and years to come.”

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