Van der Zande: Long Beach “Event of the Year” for Acura

Photo: Brandon Badroui/IMSA

Renger van der Zande says he’s hoping to deliver Acura’s first overall victory in the Grand Prix of Long Beach in more than 15 years, with the Dutchman believing this weekend’s edition could be the manufacturer’s best chance in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP era.

Van der Zande, who has two previous overall wins in the 100-minute street race, both in Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac prototypes in 2022 and 2024, will be looking to send the brand, which serves as the title sponsor of the event, back to victory lane for the first time since 2009 when Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud took top overall honors in their Acura ARX-02a LMP1 machine.

While there have been three additional overall wins by Honda-powered prototypes since, including back-to-back victories by Klaus Graf and Lucas Luhr in 2012-13 with Muscle Milk Pickett Racing, neither the Acura ARX-05 DPi nor ARX-06 LMDh car have broken through on the Southern California streets.

The No. 93 Meyer Shank Racing Acura of van der Zande and Nick Yelloly finished 11th in last year’s race after van der Zande was forced into an unscheduled stop to replace the car’s rear deck that was damaged by contact with the No. 6 Penske Porsche 963 of Mathieu Jaminet.

“It’s the event of the year for Acura,” said van der Zande. “This is an event that Acura has never won [in post-merger era]. I think it’s very important to point it out, so we’re trying to make it happen this year.

“I think it’s one of those events last year we tried hard.

“We got tapped a little bit on the left rear by one of the Porsches, and it broke something off the rear tail, which is why we had to pit, and otherwise, I think we would have been on the podium.

“It’s never seemed to be happening before, so I think when it happens this year, it’s going to be huge and that’s what we’re aiming for.

“It’s going to be the event to shine. Last year we won in Detroit, which is a street track; the car hopefully performs as good as it did in Detroit.

“And we’re coming off two races… The biggest one to win are Daytona and Sebring, and we didn’t have a shot at winning that one, those two.

“I think for Acura, if we could win the Long Beach Grand Prix would be the one.”

Known as one of the street circuit experts in the WeatherTech Championship, van der Zande said you have to be “comfortable” with the getting close to the walls in order to extract the maximum out of the car.

“It’s always a combination for sure,” he said. “I think if you don’t have a fast car or if you don’t have a compliant car, you, you’re not able to push.

“What makes a driver good at the race track, like street tracks of Long Beach, or Detroit, or Monaco, or Macau, is how close do you like to drift towards the wall.

“If you’re not sliding a little bit with a race car, you’re not fast enough, but if you’re sliding too much, you’re in the wall.

“How close are you, are you comfortable in getting towards the wall and getting close to the wall?

“But if you don’t have a car that is really bad over the bumps, then forget about it. You’re not going to go and slide around and be aggressive on the driving.

“It’s a combination of the two and but at the same time, I think it’s more something that on the street track as a driver, it’s something that you are comfortable with.

“If you’re not comfortable with the walls, then you’re going to be slow, and then it’s more a matter of not being good at… a street track.”

The 40-year-old has likened the 1.968-mile street circuit to the Guia Circuit in Macau, home of the FIA GT World Cup, as well as the Nürburgring Nordschleife.

“Still one of my favorite racetracks is Macau, which is one of the craziest racetracks around the world,” he said. “And in a way, the Nordschleife is a little bit the same.

“It’s one of those where if you make a small mistake or if you misjudge it a little bit, the consequences are huge in terms of damage, in terms of how much you’re out of the race.

“Every little mistake is a DQ. So, it’s fun, but dangerous at the same time.”

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