First of a Four-Part Series Recalling the Year’s Highlights
By IMSA.com Contributors
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – 2021 has been a monumental year for IMSA. Great strides have been made in all areas, from intense on-track competition to increased viewership, from manufacturer participation to bold new plans for the future.
This week, IMSA.com takes a look back at the highlights of the year through the eyes and words of our five regular contributing writers. The four-part series starts today with the “Best Headlines” of 2021. Enjoy.
Holly Cain: “Spin and Win with a Twist,” the IMSA.com headline proclaimed. Certainly, Swedish driver Rasmus Lindh’s eventful and inspiring work to win the IMSA Prototype Challenge’s longest race of the season at VIRginia International Raceway in October was worth every bit of the attention. While racing in second place, Lindh spun the No. 6 Performance Tech Motorsports Ligier JS P320 – a full 360 degrees while going slightly airborne – continued on, took the race lead and ultimately led the team to victory with a last-lap pass. It was such an impressive “save” that his teammate, Dan Goldburg said, “We were pretty sure he (Lindh) was done for at the moment. I thought the car was going to be on its hood wholesale, and then he saves it, keep position and picks up first. It was just nuts!”
Jeff Olson: NBC returns in 2022 with added coverage. A thorough, exceptional TV package is essential for survival in motorsports, and the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship has a sturdy partner in NBC. The locations will change somewhat in 2022 – USA will pick up for the pending loss of NBCSN – but IMSA coverage across NBC platforms will expand next year. All WeatherTech Championship races will be shown by NBC or USA, with 80 hours of live coverage overall, as well as complete streaming coverage on NBC’s Peacock platform. “IMSA fans won’t miss a minute of the action,” said Michael Perman, NBC Sports’ vice president of programming.
Godwin Kelly: The LMDh class was announced in 2020, so that doesn’t count here. But the interest from a broad band of manufacturers created one headline after another. At last count, five OEMs are working toward fielding cars in the WeatherTech Championship prototype class that kicks off in 2023. It’s caught everybody’s attention. This is what Piers Phillips, president at Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, said of the LMDh battles to come: “This new era of sports car racing that’s about to hit the United States, with the GT3 series and the LMDh program that’s coming, I think there’s a war coming that people don’t see.”
David Phillips: Never shy about making changes for the benefits of competitors and fans alike, IMSA’s decision to create a new GT Daytona (GTD) PRO class for 2022 rates among the best headlines of the year. In one fell swoop, IMSA pumped new life into the top of step of a GT ladder all but vacated by the exodus of GT Le Mans (GTLM) manufacturers and teams AND opened the door for competitors in the new GT3-based class to participate in sports car racing on the global scale. The fact that BMW, Corvette, Lamborghini, Lexus and Porsche have already committed to GTD PRO for 2022 (with additional manufacturers expected to join the party in the near future) bodes very well indeed for IMSA’s newest class.
John Oreovicz: The news that Chevrolet and Corvette Racing will develop a GT3-specification version of the mid-engine Corvette C8.R. Not only will this benefit General Motors in its efforts to establish the Corvette as a world-class sports car for global sale, it’s likely to prod longtime rival Ford into creating a GT3 version of the Mustang. Ford already produces an IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge race-winning Mustang GT4, and it would be great to see America’s best – Corvette and Mustang – go head-to-head with the rest of the world in the GT Daytona (GTD) and GTD PRO categories of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in the future.
Next: Part 2, Best Surprises of 2021