Milner Aiming to Help DXDT “Navigate” Move to Corvette

Photo: Rick Dole/IMSA

Tommy Milner believes his addition into DXDT Racing’s driver lineup for the remainder of the Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS season will help “eliminate question marks” as the team gets up to speed with the Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R.

The Corvette Racing factory driver will team up with Alec Udell in DXDT’s  second Corvette beginning with this weekend’s round at Circuit of The Americas, as a Pro class entry.

For Milner, who served as the car’s lead development driver and still holds the most mileage in the brand’s first-ever GT3 machine, the opportunity to work with the David Askew-owned operation came as a logical choice.

“It’s been an easy process so far,” he told Sportscar365. “I think the goal from David’s point of view was that he’s very excited about this opportunity to work with Corvette Racing and Pratt Miller and wants it to be as successful as possible.

“They’ve got some engineering support from Pratt Miller, having me drive one of the cars, just eliminates some of those question marks you can always have with a new car for a new team.

“The first test we had at Sebring was really good. There were no issues with the car. All of the guys had time to get up to speed and get comfortable with the car.

“It looked like [at Sebring] that realistically a podium was on the table.

“I know Scott [Smithson] was excited about driving the car. It was the fastest he had gone at Sebring in testing there with any car he had raced there before.

“He had a lot of confidence, in ways, about driving the car.

“From my point of view, I want to have results but part of it too is also helping them navigate this first year with the car so that in the future they won’t need as much help.”

Milner, whose only previous World Challenge experience came in a V12-powered Aston Martin Vantage in 2008, said he’s looking forward to adding more racing to his plate this year, alongside his full-season IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship commitments with Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports.

“When I did WEC and then last year I had done the [IMSA] endurance races, even with the WEC schedule, I felt like it wasn’t enough racing for me. The racing, I felt, was missing,” he said.

“I wouldn’t say I was pushing super hard for more racing but when the opportunity came up… my sister is the team manager at DXDT, so early on once we made the connections and it looked like they were going to get cars, then that was one of the things she asked me early on was, ‘Would you want to drive?’

“I was like, ‘Absolutely, 100 percent. More racing, I’m in.’

“I’m excited about that and I’m excited to do more racing and to go racing in SRO. It is a sprint format, it’s basically 45 minutes in the car.

“It’s been a long time since I did a sprint format kind of thing.”

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