The penultimate IMSA race weekend took place at the world center of racing, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway this past weekend. Both BMW M Team WRT and Turner Motorsport had big wins in the WeatherTech Sportscar Championship race (IWSC), and there were also two BMWs in the top five in the Michelin Pilot Challenge race. The results from Indy had some major implications in the championship standings with one race weekend left to go at Road Atlanta in two weeks.
BMW M Team WRT is not in the championship hunt in the IWSC GTP class, so the goal at Indy was to just go out and win the race. The #24 M Hybrid V8 entry of Dries Vanthoor and Sheldon van der Linde had a good start in qualifying, with Vanthoor putting the #24 car into third on the grid, with the #60 Acura taking the pole. The #25 BMW of Marco Wittmann and Philip Eng qualified ninth.
Qualifying for the GT classes was canceled due to lightning in the area, which turned out to be a good thing for the BMW teams. With no qualifying, the grid was based on points, which put the Paul Miller Racing #1 M4 GT3 EVO of Neil Verhagen and Connor De Phillippi on the pole in GTD Pro, and the #96 Turner Motorsport M4 GT3 EVO of Robby Foley and Patrick Gallagher on the pole in GTD. The Turner duo was second in points but a penalty for the points-leading #57 Mercedes-AMG put the #96 car in front.
The Indy win was for the first in IMSA for BMW M Team WRT.
Track conditions at the start were overcast but hot, with a track temperature of 115 degrees. There’s often drama in the tight turn one of the Indy road course, and there was a pileup on the first lap of this year’s race that involved seven prototypes from the GTP and LMP2 classes. Luckily, none of the BMWs were involved. Dries Vanthoor held onto third place in GTP during his stint in the #24 car, Neil Verhagen held onto the lead in GTD Pro in the #1 car, and Patrick Gallagher stayed in the top four in GTD.
With just around 47 minutes left in the race, the #24 M Hybrid V8 was in second and Sheldon van der Linde was putting relentless pressure on the leading #31 Cadillac, which is leading the championship. Van der Linde made brilliant move with around five and half minutes left to get by the #31 and take the win. It was the first win in IMSA for BMW M Team WRT since they took over the program from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
“I was pretty frustrated after the restart not to get past him earlier,” said van der Linde. “My engineer said to me on the radio, ‘You’ve got one more pack of GT cars (traffic)’ with 10 minutes to go. And I knew that was my last chance to get him. Because on pace, they were just too fast for us today. He (#31) got stuck behind a GT car going into turn 10. I got a very good run and kind of went all the way to the inside, so he wasn’t able to see me in his mirrors. And yeah, I was willing to risk everything for the win today. I know how important it is for these guys (WRT) to get it.” The #25 M Hybrid V8 of Wittmann and Eng finished 10th after a penalty for contact.
Marco Wittmann and Philipp Eng finished tenth after a penalty.
In the GTD class, Robby Foley was in second behind the #34 Ferrari later in the race but inherited the lead when the Ferrari had to serve a penalty. Meanwhile, the points-leading #57 Mercedes-AMG had charged through the field after the penalty and was gaining ground on Foley in the #96 BMW, but Foley held on to take the win by just 0.501 seconds.
Turner Motorsport won the GTD class at Indy, and drivers Patrick Gallagher and Robby Foley are just six points behind the leaders.
It was Turner’s first win in the series since August 2024 and was especially meaningful as former driver Matt Dalton passed away due to an illness last month. “With about 10 minutes to go, I look in my mirror and I’m like, ‘Of course, if there’s any car coming it’s the (No.) 57,” Foley said. “I had some more pace, our car was great today, so I just tried to manage the situation as best I could for us. A great day, kind of a storybook day. I didn’t know Matt (Dalton) as well as Patrick, but he was a great friend to me in the short time I knew him. We miss him a lot and this is for sure for him.” The win put Foley and Gallagher just six points behind the #57 Mercedes-AMG drivers heading into the final race.
Patrick Gallagher (middle left) and Robby Foley celebrate their win.
In GTD Pro, Paul Miller Racing looked set to extend their lead in the championship, but the #1 M4 GT3 EVO was hit by a Corvette during Connor De Phillippi’s stint which took off the rear bumper, and then hit and spun with 18 minutes left in the race by the #65 Ford Mustang, which brought a penalty. De Phillippi finished in sixth, but he and Verhagen lost the championship lead to Corvette drivers Tommy Milner and Nicky Catsburg, who finished second. The Paul Miller duo is now 47 points behind but still have a shot at the championship in the season-ending Petit Le Mans race at Road Atlanta in two weeks. “I really don’t know what to say,” said Verhagen. “We actually had a clean race and were in the leading group. Then, in the closing stages, our rivals started using us as a punching bag. That’s obviously the last thing you want when you’re leading the championship. We’ve now got a tough task ahead of us at the season finale, but we’ll give it our all there.”
The #1 Paul Miller Racing BMW was in the points lead before Indy but now in second going into the final.
Carbahn on Michelin Pilot Challenge Podium, Auto Technic Racing Takes Championship Lead
What started out as a very challenging race weekend at Indy for BMW teams in the Michelin Pilot Challenge series turned out to be not so bad after all, except for Turner Motorsport. The BMW M4 GT4 EVO entries were off the pace in qualifying, with the fastest BMW time (Sean McAlister in the #39 CarBahn with Peregrine Racing entry) down in 12th. Qualifying was ruled by Ford and Aston Martin, with an Aston Martin on the pole, Ford Mustang’s in second through fourth and two more Aston Martin’s in fifth and sixth.
There were several caution periods in the race, which helped to move some of the BMWs up toward the front. With 10 minutes left in the race, the #39 BMW being driven by Jeff Westphal was in eighth, Stevan McAleer was in ninth in the #27 Auto Technic Racing BMW that he shared with Austin Krainz, and Luca Mars was in tenth in the #95 Turner Motorsport M4 GT4 EVO that he drove with Dillon Machavern. More importantly, the championship-leading #95 was in front of the #13 Ford Mustang and looked set to keep the championship lead.
CarBahn with Peregrine Racing drivers Jeff Wesphal and Sean McAlister finished third in Michelin Pilot Challenge.
That all changed in the last 10 minutes. Some of the cars in the top 10 had to pit in the final moments, and a Porsche that ran out of gas and came to a stop on the circuit brought out a full-course caution with less than seven minutes in the race. The race went green with one lap left, but the #95 Turner Motorsport car was the next victim, as it slowed considerably on the last lap due to an overheating transmission and dropped to 17th on the final lap. The #39 BMW of Westphal and McAlister moved up into the final podium spot in third, with the #27 BMW of McAleer and Krainz finishing fifth. The win went to the #44 McLaren.
Auto Technic Racing drivers Austin Krainz and Stevan McAleer now lead the Michelin Pilot Challenge championship.
The up and down points battle in Michelin Pilot Challenge changed again after the Indy race. Auto Technic Racing drivers Stevan McAleer and Austin Krainz now hold a 40-point lead over Turner drivers Luca Mars and Dillon Machavern. Ford Mustang driver Robert Noaker (who finished seventh at Indy) is only 10 points behind Mars and Machavern. The championship will go down to the wire in the final race at Road Atlanta on the weekend of September 30th-October 3rd.
—David Haueter
[Photos courtesy LAT Images, BMW]