The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and Michelin Pilot Challenge always start their season at Daytona International Speedway in late January, and all of the teams that will compete in those races were at Daytona this past weekend for the “Roar Before the 24” test days, which gives them all a chance to get their cars and drivers dialed in for race weekend.
There will be five BMWs entered in the Rolex 24 at Daytona among a total of 61 cars between the four classes (GTP, LMP2, GTD Pro, GTD). In the top GTP class, the #24 BMW M Team RLL M Hybrid V8 will be driven by Philipp Eng, Dries Vanthoor, Kevin Magnussen, and Raffaele Marciello. The #25 car will be driven by Marco Wittman, Sheldon van der Linde, Robin Frijns, and René Rast. There are twelve total entries in GTP from Porsche, Cadillac, Acura and Lamborghini, in addition to BMW.
The pair of BMW M Team RLL M Hybrid V8 cars were on the pace during the Roar test. They were fastest in three of the six practice sessions they participated in and second fastest in two of the others. Dries Vanthoor set the fastest lap time of the event with a 1:35.424 lap, just two-tenths of a second ahead of former BMW works driver Nick Yelloly in the #93 Acura ARX-06. Overall, the BMWs set four of the top ten fastest practice times among all sessions. Of course, we’ve seen before that the M Hybrid V8s are fast in practice but don’t race all that well, but hopefully, they will be able to maintain that pace come race weekend.
In GTD Pro, Paul Miller Racing has expanded to two M4 GT3 EVO entries for 2025. The #1 car will be driven by Madison Snow, Neil Verhagen, Connor De Phillippi and Kelvin van der Linde at Daytona. De Phillippi is moving to GTD Pro after driving in the GTP class for BMW for the last two seasons. Kelvin van der Linde is the older brother of Sheldon van der Linde and was recently signed as a BMW factory driver. Daytona will be his first race with BMW.
Paul Miller Racing will a pair of M4 G3 EVOs in the GTD Pro class.
The #48 Paul Miller Racing GTD Pro entry will be driven by Max Hesse, Dan Harper, Jesse Krohn, and Augusto Farfus. Like De Phillippi, Krohn is being moved to GT cars after a year of driving the GTP prototype. Hesse, Harper, and Verhagen were all part of the BMW Junior program together before being signed as full works drivers. There are fifteen entries among eight manufacturers in GTD Pro.
In the GTD class, Turner Motorsport will have the sole BMW entry with the #96 M4 GT3 EVO driven by Robby Foley, Patrick Gallagher, Jake Walker, and Jens Klingmann. The GTD class is the most populous of the four classes racing at Daytona, with 22 entries among nine manufacturers.
Turner Motorsport will be the sole BMW entry in the GTD class.
The BMWs were not quite up to speed in the GTD Pro and GTD classes. The Paul Miller Racing M4 GT3 EVOs were in the bottom half of the GTD Pro field for most of the sessions, with Kevin van der Linde breaking into the top three fastest times in the fourth session. Overall, the fastest time between the two Paul Miller Racing cars that was set by van der Linde in the #1 was only good enough for eleventh fastest over all the sessions and was around seven-tenths of a second behind the fastest time set by Andrea Caldarelli in a Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.
In the GTD class, the Turner Motorsport #96 M4 GT3 EVO set a fast time with Jens Klingmann at the wheel that was only good for the 46th fastest lap among all practice session laps, but that was only around eight-tenths of a second slower than the fastest lap set in GTD by Franck Perera in the #78 Lamborghini. It’s unclear whether IMSA will make any performance adjustments before the race, but we’ve consistently seen that the M4 GT3s perform better in the race than in practice.
In the Michelin Pilot Challenge series, there are 22 GS class entries among seven manufacturers, including four BMW M4 GT4s. Turner Motorsport will once again have two entries, with the #95 car driven by Francis Selldorff and Dillon Machavern and the #96 car shared by Patrick Gallagher, Vin Barletta, and Matt Dalton. Auto Technic Racing has entered the #27 M4 GT4 EVO for father and son duo Roland and Austin Krainz, along with Stevan McAleer. The CarBahn with Peregrine Racing team led by Steve Dinan has the #39 M4 GT4 entered for Jeff Westphal and Sean McAlister.
The #39 CarBahn with Peregrine racing M4 GT4 will contest the Michelin Pilot Challenge race.
Among the five practice sessions that the Michelin Challenge series held over the Roar test weekend, the BMW M4 GT4s were not at the pace of the fastest cars. Stevan McAleer set the fastest BMW time of the event in the Auto Technic Racing M4 GT4 EVO in the fifth and final session, but it was only good enough for ninth fastest. Ford Mustang GT4s were fastest in three of the five sessions.
Auto Technic Racing, father and son duo Roland Krainz and Austin Krainz will drive in the Michelin Pilot Challenge race with Stevan McAleer.
Turner Motorsport will have two cars in the Michelin Pilot Challenge race.
NBC Sports will provide extensive coverage of the entire race weekend among the NBC, Peacock, and USA networks, and you can get more information on the schedule at this link. The four-hour Michelin Pilot Challenge race is on Friday, January 24th at 1:40 pm ET. The Rolex 24 starts at 1:30 pm ET on Saturday, the 25th.
—David Haueter
[Photo courtesy LAT IMAGES]
