Spirit of Daytona to Miss CTMP; Additional Races Unclear

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

Spirit of Daytona Racing will miss next weekend’s Mobil 1 SportsCar Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, with additional IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship races up in the air due to lack of funding, according to team owner Troy Flis.

The Florida-based team, which was sidelined from Long Beach and Mid-Ohio after crash damage to its Cadillac DPi-V.R from the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, returned to action earlier this month at Detroit with a brand-new chassis, although was hampered by gearbox failure.

While present at this weekend’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen with drivers Tristan Vautier and Matt McMurry, Flis confirmed they will not be making the trip North of the Border next week.

“We just don’t have the funding to get through this year,” he told Sportscar365.

“We knew we were short on funding and were going to miss some [races]. The crash at Sebring hurt us and put us back; that was a big one.

“We have a lot of things in the works but no commitment. If I at least get a letter of intent, we would figure a way of doing it. But we can’t keep going this way.”

While confirmed for the season-ending Motul Petit Le Mans, Flis said they are still working on securing the necessary funding for the two other remaining Prototype rounds this year.

He said they are “60-70 percent” there on the budget for the Sept. 7-9 round at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, although currently only “40-50 percent” likely to be at Road America on Aug. 3-5.

Flis indicated they are in discussions with a hotel chain for potential sponsorship for 2019, which, if secured, could help get the team through the remainder of this season.

“Definitely, [Road] Atlanta we’ll do,” he said. “We have a couple of things in the works.

“If we can those things ironed out, we’ll do Laguna for sure. Then if I can get a little more, we’ll do Road America. We’re working our way backwards.

“It sucks. We’ve been in this sport for a long time and to miss races is hard.

“The cars are so expensive to run. We don’t want to go and run a race just to run it. We don’t want to do things on a shoe-string budget. Every race we go to, we want to go to win.

“I don’t want to cut corners. We’ve got great guys and probably the best crew we’ve ever had.”

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