IMSA Makes Late Change to Road America Start Time

Photo: Peter Burke/IMSA

IMSA has moved the start of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at Road America forward by three hours, reshuffling Sunday’s schedule for the IMSA Fastlane SportsCar Weekend for a live TV opportunity.

Announced to stakeholders on Wednesday evening in a competition memo, the two-hour and 40-minute race will now take the green flag on Sun. Aug. 7 at 10:40 a.m. CT time instead of the previously confirmed 1:40 p.m.

The reason, according to a statement from the sanctioning body, is to “take advantage of a late opportunity to move to a live television broadcast window.”

Previously, the race was to be carried on a tape-delayed basis on USA Network from 6:30-9:30 p.m. ET.

“The new television window on USA Network will be 12 to 2:30 p.m. ET, giving IMSA’s passionate fans a linear television option. The revised race start time will be 11:40 a.m. ET (10:40 a.m. CT) with live streaming on Peacock,” the statement read.

“The telecast will join the racing action in progress at the top of the hour and continue through 2:30 p.m. ET.”

The shuffle has resulted in the elimination of warmup on Sunday morning, as well as moving the second Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America race to after the WeatherTech Championship round for a 1:55 p.m. start time.

The start time for Sunday’s Porsche Carrera Cup North America presented by The Cayman Islands race, meanwhile, has been brought forward to 8:20 a.m.

The late change, coming two weeks before load-in for the event, is understood to have caused scheduling complications for some Super Trofeo teams, given that travel had already been booked.

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