Gill: Back-to-Back Enduros at Indy “Not Fair to Anybody”

Photo: Fabian Lagunas/SRO

SRO America President and CEO Greg Gill said he doesn’t feel there’s room for “back-to-back” endurance races from SRO and IMSA to be held at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, as is the case this year.

This weekend’s fifth running of the Indianapolis 8 Hour presented by AWS takes place only two weeks after IMSA’s newly expanded six-hour Battle on the Bricks WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race.

Coupled with Ferrari Challenge North America’s event at The Brickyard the week prior, this year’s calendar saw three sports car racing events at the track in a four-week span.

That will change in 2025, with SRO recently revising the date for its long-standing 8 Hour race, which will take place two weeks later on Oct. 16-18, in an effort to create a larger gap to the revived Suzuka 1000 km, as well as taking into consideration the IMSA date.

“Is there room to almost do back-to-back events?” questioned Gill.

“I do not want to do back-to-back and Stephane [Ratel, SRO Motorsports Group founder and CEO] doesn’t either.

“We know we’re going to take a little gamble with the weather going later [next year] but our goal is to not have something that’s two weeks apart.

“It just doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s not fair to anybody, teams, the promoters, fans, etc.

“Our partnership with Indy has been fantastic. They are really strongly supporting us.

“The community has supported us, the numbers at the gate are up again for this year. There’s a lot of positives that we’re excited about.

“I see this as a long-term, really wonderful relationship.”

Saturday’s GT3 enduro, which will again run into the darkness as the only night race held at The Brickyard, has continued to see steady growth, both from Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS entrants and Intercontinental GT Challenge participants.

The event has also attracted increased global interest according to Gill.

“I think the nicest thing that we’ve seen is pro drivers globally [want to come to the 8H],” he said. “When I was at Bathurst, I was so surprised to see the number of people that said, ‘I want to go to Indy!’

“The IGTC is seeing that growth. We have nine [IGTC] cars this weekend and I think we’re going to see it continue to grow.

“People are putting it into their plans. We love finishing the year on a nice, high note, with 20-plus cars, which is a great number.

“I think we’re going to continue to see that growth, by all indications.”

Gill said their goal will be to continue to grow the event in the coming years, which he stressed will remain on the SRO calendar as one of its pinnacle endurance races.

“We’re happy with more cars that were on the grid than last year; that’s great and is always a good indication,” he said.

“On the American side of GT World Challenge, this is the first year that I can see in 12 years that the end of the season race is larger than the races at the beginning of the season.

“That speaks to good growth for World Challenge, as well from GT America, GT4 America, Touring Car and even the stuff that [Toyota] GR Cup is doing and growing.

“We want to see this continue to grow. When you have eight hours and see this festival aspect, we want to continue 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