Pfaff to Depart WeatherTech Championship at End of Season

Photo: Brandon Badraoui/IMSA

Pfaff Motorsports will pause its IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship program at the end of the season, amid a renewed focus on supporting up-and-coming Canadian drivers and new developments at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.

Crew members of the Steve Bortolotti-led team were informed of the decision during last weekend’s Motul SportsCar Endurance Grand Prix at Road America.

The Canadian squad, owned by Pfaff Automotive President and CEO Chris Pfaff, has been a mainstay in the WeatherTech Championship since 2019, having won the inaugural WeatherTech Sprint Cup title before going on to season-long GTD and GTD Pro class championships, including class victory in the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

While starting with Porsche machinery and a brief one-year stint with McLaren, the team has been Lamborghini’s factory partner in the GTD Pro class since 2025, initially with the Huracan GT3 EVO2 before giving the Temerario GT3 its global race debut in this year’s Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring.

It claimed victory on Sunday Road America, marking the new-for-2026 car’s first endurance race win.

Speaking with Sportscar365 prior to the historic win, Chris Pfaff said the decision for the hiatus, from a team capacity, was not performance related.

“Not really, no, I wouldn’t say that’s the case,” he said. “Despite the struggles, Lamborghini has been fantastic to work with. They’ve been very reactive to what we needed to do.

“We knew going in, with a brand-new car, it was going to be a challenge for sure.

“We’re pausing [the race program] but we’re still trying to keep a foot in the door for 2027 for sure.

“We’ve been at it for a while and if I was just saying, ‘I’m done, I’m moving on to something else or just getting out of it’ I would tell you that.

“But it’s not really the case. We are still working on some possibilities for next year, but nothing we can announce yet.

“I had to let my team members know, to be fair to them, if we weren’t in it next year that they had opportunity to find other employment.”

Pfaff said his purchase of CTMP in December 2025, along with partners Peter Thomson and Alek Krstajic, was a factor in the decision, as well his personal ambition to support Canadian driving talent.

The brand has previously supported drivers such as Zach Robichon and Scott Hargrove, as well more recently Zachary Vanier, who made his WeatherTech Championship debut in the team’s Temerario GT3 at Long Beach this year.

“With the track, we bought CTMP and we’ve got big plans of how to expand that,” said Pfaff.

“Part of that is the whole ecosystem of motorsports and wanting to bring the karting kids up. I’ve got a ten-year-old running in karts. He’s lucky because I’m very involved.

“But I’m trying to create opportunities for other kids who don’t maybe have access to financial means, etc. Once they graduate from karting, they’ve got talent, they can get into cars.

“We’re looking at that. We’re definitely going to keep the Pfaff Motorsports business going and looking at different things we’re going to do.

“I’m definitely not saying goodbye or goodnight to IMSA. We still want to be involved and we’re working on some interesting stuff as we speak.”

Pfaff hinted that its departure from the top-level of IMSA competition could only be temporary and also hasn’t ruled out a presence in one or several IMSA-sanctioned single-make series.

“[In 2028] you could well see us back fully with the team,” he said. “We’ve been talking to a few Am drivers, so maybe it’s not [GTD] Pro. We’re looking to create a full [platform] where we can do stuff like Super Trofeo or Porsche Carrera Cup.”

With Paul Miller Racing, at least under its current guise, also set to not be present on the grid in 2027, the series faces a possible reduction of GTD Pro entries for next year.

However, Sportscar365 understands that Lamborghini is likely to remain in GTD Pro, with a tender process underway that has seen bids from both Riley Motorsports and Wayne Taylor Racing, with WTR believed to be a leading candidate to take over the factory supported program.

Pfaff ‘Never Imagined’ Level of Team’s Success

Reflecting on the achievements of the team, which has been a fan-favorite in the IMSA paddock with its now-iconic plaid livery, Chris Pfaff admitted he never thought it would reach the levels it has to date.

The majority of its success has come with Porsche, which saw Robichon and Laurens Vanthoor win the 2021 GTD championship and Matt Campbell and Mathieu Jaminet triumph in GTD Pro the following year, which also included the Rolex 24 class win.

“I give a lot of credit to Steve [Bortolotti] for that,” said Pfaff. “He really does run the racing operation. I’ve been the more commercial guy, obviously writing checks but also putting together our commercial sponsors, and I enjoy that quite frankly.

“I didn’t imagine it for sure. Now getting into race track ownership, that’s another aspect of the business.

“The automotive world is changing drastically as well as racing.

“Motorsports is really becoming, I would say, even an higher priority for manufacturers to be involved, so we want to be part of that and we have a lot of experience in that and I see a lot of opportunity in that.”

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