In a classic finish, Acura Meyer Shank Racing, Renger van der Zande, and Nick Yelloly converted their first pole of 2025 into a win in the Chevrolet Sports Car Classic at Detroit. The #93 Acura ARX-06 pulled off the victory after van der Zande overtook Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing’s Ricky Taylor with less than five minutes to go.
It’s the first win for Meyer Shank Racing in IMSA since returning from a one-year sabbatical, and the first for van der Zande and Yelloly with their new team and manufacturer.
Taylor, who seemingly made the race-winning pass just minutes earlier, and co-driver Filipe Albuquerque finished second in the #10 Cadillac V-Series.R, the first podium for Cadillac Racing in either IMSA or WEC.
Porsche Penske Motorsport’s incredible four-race winning streak in GTP came to an end, but both cars still earned solid top-five finishes. The #6 Porsche 963 of Mathieu Jaminet and Matt Campbell was third, just ahead of the championship-leading #7 Porsche of Nick Tandy and Felipe Nasr.
Rounding out the top five in GTP was the #24 Team RLL BMW M Hybrid V8 (Dries Vanthoor/Philipp Eng), with the #60 MSR Acura (Tom Blomqvist/Colin Braun) in sixth, and the #25 BMW (Sheldon van der Linde/Marco Wittmann) in seventh, following a post-race time penalty for overtaking under yellows.
The #23 Aston Martin THOR Team Valkyrie (Ross Gunn/Roman de Angelis) tied its best result of 2025 in eighth.
Yelloly controlled the opening stint of the race in the #93 Acura, leading a Meyer Shank 1-2 ahead of the #60 of Tom Blomqvist. After a brief Full Course Yellow for debris, Tandy continued a charge towards the front and moved up to fourth, while Albuquerque had gained three spots on the opening lap to climb to fifth.
As teams made their pit stops for fuel and driver changes, some quick in-laps from Tandy and a fast pit stop from the Penske crew allowed the #7 Porsche, now in the hands of Nasr, to take the net lead ahead of the #93 Acura of van der Zande.
A long first stint and a quicker stop for the #10 Cadillac allowed Taylor to slot into second place, but with Nasr out in front, a fifth straight win for Porsche Penske seemed inevitable.
With less than 40 minutes to go, a collision between two GTD PRO cars (the #65 Ford and #48 Paul Miller BMW) bunched the field up again, but on the restart with 28 minutes left, Nasr got an outstanding jump and put distance between himself, Taylor and van der Zande.
Taylor didn’t let Nasr escape. Just as he did last year with a strong move up the inside of turn three to take the win, Taylor tried the same move with 15 minutes to go. While Nasr was able to shut the door through turn three, Taylor surprised the Brazilian by cutting back and lunging up the inside of Nasr to take the lead.
Van der Zande then slipped past Nasr for second, and Jaminet followed him through into third place. The Acura kept closing in on the Cadillac, and with five minutes left, van der Zande got a great exit out of the final two corners and dove up the inside of Taylor to grab the lead.
The #93 Acura held on to win by a final margin of 0.947s over the #10 Cadillac.
Nasr and Tandy still lead the IMSA GTP Drivers’ Championship by 70 points over Jaminet and Campbell, and now Porsche Penske’s focus will turn towards the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the pursuit of Porsche’s 20th overall Le Mans win.
After a storybook duel between Ford and Corvette, it was the #64 Ford Multimatic Motorsports Mustang GT3 of Sebastian Priaulx and Mike Rockenfeller that took the GTD PRO class win over the #3 Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Antonio Garcia and Alexander Sims.
Rockenfeller held off Sims by 1.6 seconds to take the factory Ford team’s second win of 2025, and the first for the #64 car.
Sims and Garcia clawed their way up from eighth on the grid to finish second, but Sims was only three-tenths ahead of the third-placed #9 Pfaff Motorsports Lamborghini Huracan GT3 of Andrea Caldarelli and Marco Mapelli. Pfaff scored its first podium of the year and first as a Lamborghini customer team.
Following a collision in the final minutes between Laurin Heinrich and Nicky Catsburg, the No.77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R and #4 Pratt Miller Corvette were demoted to fifth and sixth, behind the #14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3 (Jack Hawksworth/Aaron Telitz), that overcame two drive-through penalties for pit lane problems to finish fourth.
Heinrich and AO Racing team-mate Klaus Bachler still lead the GTD PRO standings, but by only 31 points over the Corvette duo of Sims and Garcia. Priaulx and Rockenfeller moved up to third in the table after their win today.
The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship returns on Sunday, 22 June, for the Sahlen’s Six Hours at the Glen, the third race of the Michelin Endurance Cup.
Images © Brett Farmer / IMSA / Lumen Digital Agency
