IMSA put on quite a show yesterday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. I watch IMSA and I know the drivers and cars, but I don’t follow the series intently or go to enough races to fully understand the series. If some of these observations seem naive, I apologize. I do know racing, and here are some of my observations from Sunday.
Close Margins
What a tough loss for the 31 team. It was their race to win until it wasn’t Earl Bamber took the lead about 40 minutes into the race, and the Cadillac still led after Jack Aitken took the reins. A great move by Sheldon van der Linde with three laps to go got the BMW in front and won by 2.926 seconds.
Laurin Heinrich drove a valiant race in the number 6 Penske Porsche, pushing to third place from fifth on the final restart, but the car seemed to struggle in traffic, giving him little chance to contend with BMW and Cadillac. The best part of the day for Heionrich was minimizing the points loss to Aitken and Bamber. Heinrich trails by 147 going into the final race of the season at the petit Le Mans. While it’s a tall order, the nighttime hours at Michelin Raceway tend to get pretty wild.
The most decisive class victory was in LMP2, where IndyCar driver Christian Rasmussen and Nick Boulle won by 24.953 seconds.
Lost in all the attention the series places on its top GTP class, were terrific battles in GTD Pro and GTD. The GTD Preo fight came down to the last lap in an All-American shootout between Ford and Chevy. The Ford Mustang driven by Dan Olsen edged the Corvette of Nick Catsburg by 0.993 seconds. The two made contact forcing Catsburg off track in the final moments.
In GTD the Turner Motorsport BMW driven by Patrick Ward and Robby Foley edged the Mercedes from Winward Racing driven by Russell Ward and Phillip Ellis by just half a second.
Notes
The six lap accident in turn 1 appeared to have been precipitated by the sloppy start of the prototype group. I don’t know what the start rules are in IMSA, but it sure looked like cars broke formation early.
The wreck ruined the days of several contenders including the number 7 Porsche in GTP, and the 99 in LMP2. The 99 got the worst of the wreck. I have never seen so many shards after contact. The car did return to action, finishing 8th in class and 40th overall.
2026 IndyNXT by Firestone champion Nikita Johnson had a tough break. Johnson was leading GTD Pro with just a few laps left when his McLaren needed to stop for a splash of fuel. He fell to eigthh in class.
While IMS reported a record attendance for this event, it seemed to me that the crowd was smaller than the 2025 attendance. From my vantage point on the turn 2 mounds, my area and the turn 1 mound seemed much more sparsely populated than they did a year ago. A friend who watched the race from home had the same observation. The suites must have been packed.
While the GTP battle for the l;e3ad was compelling, IMSA and its television partners need to give significantly more attention to the other classes. The battle for the GTD Pro victory was a classic door banging rumble which few saw live. Spread the coverage around more.
The Proper Length?
Since sports car racing returned to IMS in 2023, we have seen two six-hour races sandwiched between two two-hour, 40-minutes events. Which is the proper length for the race at IMS?
Each distance has its own merits, but i prefer the shorte3r race. I found it more intriguing and intense. The six-hour contests were fun in a different way, but the first two thirds had many lulls.
The 160-minute race has more of a sense of urgency to it, which I enjoy. My preference for the shorter length may stem from my open wheel background, where defined length events have a constant intensity where every second counts.
As I left the tr4ack yesterday afternoon, I bid a reluctant farewell to IMS for 2026, set for another icy Indiana winter to come and go, and to wait for May to once again bring the hallowed ground to life.
