2023 IMSA SportsCar Weekend

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Track map of Road America

The 2023 IMSA SportsCar Weekend was a sports car race sanctioned by the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA). The race was held at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin on August 6, 2023. The event was the eighth round of the 2023 IMSA SportsCar Championship, and the fifth round of the WeatherTech Sprint Cup.

The No. 31 Cadillac of Pipo Derani qualified in pole position by recording the fastest lap in qualifying, but started at the back of the GTP field after his car crashed in warm up. This allowed the No. 7 Porsche of Matt Campbell and Felipe Nasr to start from first position. The car kept the lead through the following sequence of pit stops and Nasr drove the Porsche across the start/finish line at the end of the race to claim his ninth SportsCar Championship victory and Campbell's eleventh. Meyer Shank Racing 's No. 60 car of Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun finished second ahead and the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing car of Filipe Albuquerque and Ricky Taylor took third.

The Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category was won by the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports car of Ben Keating and Paul-Loup Chatin with Giedo van der Garde and John Falb in TDS Racing's No. 35 in second. Josh Burdon and Gar Robinson took victory in LMP3. Burdon took the lead in the closing stages and earned him his fourth SportsCar Championship victory and Robinson's eleventh. Ross Gunn and Alex Riberas took their second consecutive win in GTD Pro of the season ahead of Ben Barnicoat and Jack Hawksworth in the No. 14 Lexus. Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow were unchallenged throughout the race and took their fourth win of the season in GTD, ahead of The No. 70 Inception Racing car of Brendan Iribe and Frederik Schandorff.

The result meant Albuquerque and Taylor became the leaders of the Drivers' Championship with 2171 points, 18 ahead of sixth-placed finishers Derani and Sims and a further 59 points in front of Connor De Phillippi and Nick Yelloly. Nick Tandy and Mathieu Jaminet retained fourth place and Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun rounded out the top five. Cadillac remained in the lead of the Manufactures' Championship with 2414 points, 35 in front of their nearest rival Acura in second followed by Porsche in third, and a further 27 ahead of BMW with three races left in the season.

Background

Road America, where the race was held.

International Motor Sports Association's (IMSA) president John Doonan confirmed the race was part of the schedule for the 2023 IMSA SportsCar Championship (IMSA SCC) in August 2022.[1] It was the tenth consecutive year the event will be held as part of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. The 2023 IMSA SportsCar Weekend was the eighth of eleven scheduled sports car races of 2023 by IMSA, and it was the fifth round held as part of the WeatherTech Sprint Cup.[2] The race was held at the ten-turn 4.048 mi (6.515 km) Road America on August 6, 2023.[3]

Breaking tradition, IMSA didn't hold their "State of the Series" annual press conference during the Road America race weekend. IMSA moved it to the Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta race weekend.[4]

After the 2022 season, the venue was renovated. Drainage areas were upgraded, the pitlane was paved, and the track was resurfaced.[5][6]

On July 27, 2023, released the latest technical bulletin outlining Balance of Performance for the event. In GTP, The Acura ARX-06 received a 2 kilogram weight reduction whereas the BMW M Hybrid V8 and Porsche 963 were given weight reductions of 1 kilogram each. The Cadillac V-Series.R remained at 1030 kilograms while all the GTP cars received increases in energy.[7] In GTD Pro and GTD, The Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo received a 10 kilogram weight reduction while the Acura NSX GT3 Evo22 received a fuel capacity increase of 3 liters.[8]

Before the race, Pipo Derani and Alexander Sims led the GTP Drivers' Championship with 1872 points, ahead of Connor De Phillippi and Nick Yelloly in second with 1862 points, and Filipe Albuquerque and Ricky Taylor in third.[9] With 973 points, Ben Hanley and George Kurtz led the LMP2 Drivers' Championship, 3 points ahead of Mikkel Jensen and Steven Thomas in second.[9] In LMP3, Felipe Fraga and Gar Robinson led the Drivers' Championship with a 181-point advantage over Wayne Boyd and Anthony Mantella.[9] Ben Barnicoat and Jack Hawksworth led the GTD Pro Drivers' Championship with 2462 points, ahead of Antonio García and Jordan Taylor with 2311 points.[9] In GTD, the Drivers' Championship was led by Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow with 2226 points, ahead of Roman De Angelis and Marco Sørensen with 2140 points.[9] Cadillac, Lexus, and BMW were leading their respective Manufacturers' Championships, while Whelen Engineering Racing, CrowdStrike Racing by APR, Riley Motorsports, Vasser Sullivan Racing, and Paul Miller Racing each led their own Teams' Championships.[9]

Entries