Sebring Wednesday Notebook

Photo: Jonathan Grace

***Four IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship cars are sporting special gold Mobil 1-themed liveries for this weekend’s Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Cadillac in recognition of Mobil 1’s 50th anniversary: No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac V-Series.R, Nos. 3 and 4 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs and the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3.

***The Lexus, which won the GTD Pro championship last year in the hands of Jack Hawksworth and Ben Barnicoat, has a dual-purpose livery as it also celebrates their title success from the 2023 season.

***The No. 120 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R also has a new livery this weekend, with the blue Geico design that it sported as part of filming for the Brad Pitt Formula 1 movie at Daytona replaced by a green and yellow scheme that it previously used in Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS. The team’s hauler has also been given a completely new look, with all references to the fictional Chip Hart Racing stable seen at Daytona removed.

***Kellymoss with Riley’s Porsche, which was a late withdrawal from Sebring, has been pulled for the remainder of the season according to team co-owner Bill Riley, who told Sportscar365 that it was determined the David Brule-led program has been completed. Brule was slated to contest the full season with Alec Udell in the No. 92 car.

***Riley said he’s working with Kellymoss co-owners Andy Kilcoyne and Victoria Thomas to potentially get a GTD class Porsche back on track later this season but admitted there’s a number of factors currently at play, including grid limitations that’s set by IMSA at certain circuits.

***Of Note, the 58-car entry for Saturday’s race is four short of the 62-car maximum grid capacity as outlined in the event’s supplementary regulations.

***Kellymoss with Riley, meanwhile, has continued its partnership in IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, fielding a Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport for reigning Porsche Carrera Cup North America champion Riley Dickinson and fellow one-make series graduate Michael McCarthy, who head into Friday’s Alan Jay Automotive 120 as the GS class points leaders after their Daytona victory.

***In a change for this year, points from January’s Rolex 24 at Daytona count towards the full season LMP2 championship. It means the Daytona class-winning No. 18 Era Motorsport entry of Ryan Dalziel, Dwight Merriman and Connor Zilisch lead the drivers’ standings entering this weekend.

***The last time LMP2 points from Daytona counted in the full season LMP2 championship was in 2019.

***Henrik Hedman has been confirmed as the mandatory Bronze driver aboard the No. 81 DragonSpeed Oreca, forming an all-Scandinavian lineup with Malthe Jakobsen and Rasmus Lindh. The Swede had not yet been named on the original pre-event entry list released last week.

***IMSA has made several changes to the WeatherTech Championship sporting regulations since Daytona, including updated language on race finish procedures amid the wake of the early checkered flag in January’s season-opener.

***The display of the checkered flag will take place on the lap after the display of the white flag, now regardless of overall race time. Additionally, “due to the unpredictability of race pace of the overall leader” race control will determine with timing and scoring on when the white flag is announced and displayed.

***In the event of a late full course caution where there is only a single lap of green flag racing, the starter, under the command of race control, can display both the green and white flags simultaneously.

***Additionally, Should the checkered flag be “inadvertently or otherwise displayed” before the leading car completes the scheduled number of laps or before the prescribed time has been completed, the race is deemed ended when the flag is displayed.

***In a separate update issued last month, the finishing positions of cars not eligible in the Trueman (LMP2) and Akin (GTD) Bronze Cup championships will be invisible in the Cup  results, meaning that Trueman/Akin-nominated cars will be elevated in the finishing positions accordingly.

***Porsche Penske Motorsport, as well as other Porsche entries in GTP, GTD Pro and GTD, have a chance at making history this weekend, with the German manufacturer one class victory away from a milestone 600th win in IMSA competition

***Should one of the Porsche 963s visit victory lane, it would mark a record-extending 19th Sebring 12-hour overall victory, while Team Penske is on the cusp of its 100th sports car racing pole and 100th sports car racing victory this weekend.

***Renger van der Zande is set to make his 100th race start in WeatherTech Championship competition this weekend. He debuted driving a Starworks Motorsport Oreca FLM09 at the Rolex 24 at Daytona in 2014 after already taking part in six American Le Mans Series races with the Peter Baron-led team the year prior.

***Van der Zande told Sportscar365: “It’s my favorite championship around the world. I think the multi-class racing, how aggressive you need to be, how clever you need to be on track to make a difference, suits my style.”

***Ian Willis is serving in his first official race as engineer and strategist on the No. 64 Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3 after having been integrated alongside David Wilcock, who engineered the car at Daytona.

***The No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac, meanwhile, sees Justin Taylor as the new race engineer, replacing Danielle Shepherd, who has moved to the NTT IndyCar Series to serve as Kyffin Simpson’s race engineer.

***AWA competition director Jeff Braun has praised Pratt Miller’s “open book” approach to its Corvette Z06 GT3.R customer teams. Braun told Sportscar365 that the Canadian squad has been looped into multiple technical meetings over each weekend, and have already taken lessons learned from fellow customer TF Sport’s recent FIA World Endurance Championship debut with the cars.

***Braun said the team completed “systems testing” with both Corvettes at Carolina Motorsports Park in Kershaw, S.C. last week and have continued to make progress after its double retirement at Daytona due to various issues including power steering pump failure and and an issue with the car’s electronic clutch.

***Tower Motorsports has two driver options, both full-season GTP pilots, in contention to fill in for Charlie Eastwood at the LMP2 headline round at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in July according to team principal Ricky Capone.

***The CTMP race is one of three clashing events with the FIA World Endurance Championship and the only WeatherTech Championship LMP2 overlap, which sees a number of other full-time WEC drivers impacted, including Paul di Resta (United Autosports), Mikkel Jensen (TDS Racing), and Paul-Loup Chatin (AO Racing).

***Capone revealed to Sportscar365 that it discovered floor damage on the No. 8 Oreca 07 Gibson following the Rolex 24, which impacted the car’s performance in the race. The team finished fifth in class with Scott McLaughlin, John Farano, Michael Dinan and Ferdinand Habsburg at the wheel.

***Tower is the defending LMP2 winners at Sebring, having finished third overall in the race following the late-race carnage in GTP.

***IMSA recently announced it reached an agreement to extend three of the sanctioning organization’s Official Partners: CrowdStrike, Skip Barber Racing School and TSM-Model. Each extension is for multiple years and includes expanded roles for each of the partners.

***WeatherTech Championship teams have three practice sessions on tap for Thursday, from 10:05-11:35 a.m., 3:05-4:35 p.m. and 7:45-9:15 p.m. (all times EDT), with qualifying scheduled for Friday afternoon.

Davey Euwema contributed to this report

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