Pink Cadillac followup
DSC lifted the lid yesterday, and today Cadillac Racing has told us more about running a pink V-Series.R for Chip Ganassi Racing this weekend at Petit.
The pink livery which first popped up on a show car at Circuit of the Americas for Pink Cadillac Day on 1 September has resurfaced to benefit the American Cancer Society during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
The #01 Cadillac will sport the hashtag #WeRaceFor, encouraging survivors and their families to share their stories using the hashtag via Instagram. General Motors will donate five dollars per share towards the American Cancer Society.
Chevrolet has raised more than $20 million towards the American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer campaign over the past 14 years.
In addition, drivers Renger van der Zande, Sebastien Bourdais, and Scott Dixon will be introduced to the fans on Saturday morning as they walk out to the song “Pink Cadillac”.
Sign your name on Rexy tomorrow!
In recent years, Meyer Shank Racing (nee Michael Shank Racing) allowed fans to sign its cars before the final race of each season.
With MSR absent from the IMSA grid this year, AO Racing has carried the torch of this tradition and given fans the chance to sign Rexy the GT3 Rawr ahead of his last race of 2024!
https://twitter.com/AORacingUSA/status/1844149450706452697
Signings will take place tomorrow from 9:30-10:00 AM and 12:30-1:00 PM EDT.
Scott Dixon, 50 starts in 20 years
Scott Dixon recently made his 400th career IndyCar Series start this summer at The Milwaukee Mile. This weekend he makes his 50th IMSA start, in a span of 25 years.
Dixon made his American sports car racing debut at this event in 1999, driving a Ferrari 333 SP alongside Stefan Johansson and Jim Mathews. He then made his first Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona start five years later, his first of 21 consecutive appearances in the race which he’s won three times overall (2006, 2015, 2020) and once more in class (2018).
When remarking on his milestone appearance, Dixon said: “It’s kind of crazy to be honest. It’s not been a full-time thing, but I still remember it clear as day starting Daytona in 2004 with Scott Pruett and Max Papis. And what a wild intro that was to endurance racing.”
“I had done Petit Le Mans back in 1999 with Stefan Johansson and Jim Matthews, which was a cool way to start in a Ferrari 333 SP. It’s kind of mind-boggling that it’s 50 starts, and I’ve enjoyed every second of it.”
Night practice requirements
48 drivers will need to take part in Practice 3 tonight to be authorised to drive during the night in the race. The list of drivers can be seen here.
All Bronze-rated drivers, and any Silver-rated drivers who have not raced at the circuit within the last two years, must complete at least three laps to be certified for night driving.
Steven Aghakhani & Luca Mars take VP Racing Challenge titles with Race 1 victories
IMSA has two new VP Racing Challenge Series champions: Steven Aghakhani and Luca Mars, who only needed to show up to officially clinch their respective championships in Race 1, won their classes.
The #6 MLT Motorsports Ligier JS P320 of Aghakhani won the LMP3 class ahead of the two Gebhardt Intralogistics Motorsports Duquiene D08s, the #31 of Markus Pommer and the #30 of Valentino Catalano.
Jagger Jones took the chequered flag first on the road, but he was given a ten-second time penalty after the race for changing lanes at the start of the race, taking him and his #87 FastMD Racing by Remstar Duquiene down to fourth.
That gave Aghakhani, who first made headlines as a 13-year-old driving Lamborghini Super Trofeo cars in NASA competition, his first professional racing championship at age 21.
“To have my entire racing career and not have a single championship, but now to finally secure that, it’s an unreal feeling – especially to be sharing it with my dad. I’m absolutely blessed for this opportunity,” Aghakhani said. “For us it wasn’t just, ‘take a championship home.’ For us, it was a, ‘prove why we’re here.’ And I think we absolutely did that.”
Mars took the victory in GSX, his sixth of the season, driving the #59 KohR Motorsports Ford Mustang GT4 – the same car that he drove to the Mustang GT4’s first-ever victory at Daytona.
Patrick Wilmot finished second in the #88 Split Decision Motorsports BMW M4 GT4, while Bronze driver Tyler Hoffman was third in his #9 Kingpin Racing Toyota GR Supra GT4 Evo.
“It feels great to still have one race left in the season and already have the championship locked up,” said Mars. “I want to thank all the Ford Performance guys and everyone at KohR Motorsports for all their hard work this year. They really gave us their all and it’s paying off.
“We started with this car brand new and kept developing it and getting better with it every weekend. To be here and keep racking up the wins, it feels great.”
Wagner wins, Fletcher falters in another dramatic MX-5 Cup Race 1
Gresham Wagner won Race 1 of the Whelen Mazda MX-5 Cup’s finale and moved into prime position to win his second championship in his #5 McCumbee McAleer Racing MX-5, after polesitter Jeremy Fletcher crashed on the final lap.
Fletcher was pushed off into the gravel with just two corners left in Thursday’s race, dropping him from a fight for second with Westin Workman to a 20th-place result – a catastrophe for the young man who led the standings going into this race. Wagner slipped through from third to first on the last lap to win.
Rookie Parker DeLong was second, finishing an astronomical six-tenths of a second behind the winner, with two-time champion Jared Thomas in third, and Workman in fourth.
CUPRA Leon VZ set to make US debut in 2025 Michelin Pilot Challenge
IMSA announced today that the CUPRA Leon VZ TCR will make its American racing debut next year in the Michelin Pilot Challenge series, making the Spanish automaker the 19th manufacturer to compete across IMSA’s seven sanctioned racing series.
CUPRA was introduced as a standalone brand of automobiles by its parent firm SEAT in 2018, following years of success from the original Cupra Racing team. SEAT announced during its annual press conference in March that CUPRA will enter the American market for the first time “before the end of the decade”.
“IMSA proudly welcomes CUPRA to our family of manufacturer partners,” said IMSA President John Doonan. “This manufacturer partnership is unique in that CUPRA is a brand that will use the IMSA platform to introduce itself ahead of its planned expansion into the US market. This approach reinforces the value of IMSA – and specifically the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge – and opens the door to new storytelling opportunities and perhaps a blueprint for other manufacturers to follow in the future.”
Feature image © Cadillac; additional images © Jack Webster / Dailysportscar.com
