Joining up together for one last time this season, all five classes of the IMSA Weathertech Championship will again do battle with a provisional fifty-four cars listed on the entry (although some have now fallen by the wayside since) amongst the GTP, LMP2, LMP3, GTD Pro and GTD classes.

Amongst that lot, just three Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTD powered crews will take part from both the Heart of Racing and Magnus Racing teams. We would have thought that the Andretti AMR GT3 might have tried to enter this round considering their apparent intentions to be full season entries next season – maybe they did but couldn’t get in, we don’t know.

For the #44 Magnus Racing team of John Potter, Andy Lally and Spencer Pumpelly, the again have only been down as Endurance Cup round entries (plus whatever takes their fancy in-between) only where the crew presently sit fourth in their GTD Championship with still enough points available by the end of this weekend’s events to lift the crown should they finish high upon the podium and with those ahead faltering at some point.

Then there is the #27 Heart of Racing AMR Vantage GTD of Roman de Angelis, Marco Sorenson and Ian James who sit at the top of the GTD Endurance Cup leader board going into this final round with a margin of just one point from the chasing Mercedes AMG GT3 crew behind.

Whilst the 2023 GTD Sprint Cup Champiosnhip has already been settled with the #27 Heart of Racing crew this time finishing second to the dominant BMW crew of Bryan Sellars and Madison Snow, the #27 pairing will have a fight on their hands this weekend to finish second again to the Sellars/Snow/BMW combination within the main GTD Championship stakes. The points gap to the P1 team is now insurmountable.

Unfortunately, it is a similar thread for the #23 GTD Pro Heart of Racing AMR entry of Ross Gunn, Alex Riberas (and David Pittard for this event) presently rest at the foot of that championship table after mid-season BoP adjustments to their Vantage effectively threw them out of the championship battle after a heroic mid-season charge after something of a dodgy start.

They sit P5 overall and some 373 points behind the somewhat consistent performing Lexus and with only 302 points being available – a decent championship finish is still possible albeit not the overall crown.

Practice for these guys kicks off on Thursday with three Free Practice sessions before Qualifying on Friday and the start of the final ten-hour race starting at 11:40hrs local on Saturday.

Unfortunately, other prior commitments will keep as away from the screen but if you live outside the mainland USA, you should be able to stream the race live via the IMSA TV link on their website. Good luck to all and have a safe race – it’s been fun ‘being there’ with you!

Photo credits – Teams / Series / Michelin / social media / J Price Photo

This weekend sees the Heart of Racing team back within the IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship paddock for the penultimate round of the 2023 season from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway with their two AMR Vantage GTD entries alongside that (confirmed this time) of the #94 Andretti Autosport Vantage GTD.

As usual, Gunn and Riberas will battle it out within GTD Pro with their #23 car whilst Roman de Angelis and Marco Sorenson do likewise within their #27 GTD class car with Jarett Andretti and Gabby Chaves hopefully being able to make it along to the end within their #94 car.

Last seen out at VIR at the end of August the teams great string of recent results within both classes was thwarted with a negative BoP adjustment against the car that saw both crews struggle to eventually come home well down the collective GTD Pro and GTD only pecking order.

Whilst that result has left the #23 crew a massive 391 in arrears to the class leader (and effectively out of contention back in P5), the #27 crew find themselves a similar points distant behind (375) but they still retain a P2 position within the standing, so any incident involving the pace setting BMW crew of Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow would work in the favour.

This weekend also sees the Championship return to its multi-class format as all five classes return to do battle around the iconic American circuit layout of the bank oval and its infield circuit. Friday and Saturday see the Free Practice and Qualifying sessions with the two-hour forty minute race starting 13:10hrs local on Sunday.

Photo credits – Team / Series / J Price

Three podiums including two race wins on the bounce later for the #23 Heart of Racing AMR crew of Ross Gunn and Alex Riberas has seen the series take action to ‘redress’ an apparent imbalance between the Aston Martin against its rivals equipment.

That is of course rotten luck for the crew after the results from Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Lime Rock and most recently from Road America has seen that GTD Pro crew elevate themselves back into contention within the class after something of a poor start in fifth in the Championship but still some 342-points back from the untethered Lexus with three rounds (including VIR) remaining.

Also running will be the twenty strong GTD class only event will be the #27 Heart of Racing AMR Vantage GTD of Roman De Angelis and Marco Sorenson who also enjoyed class winning success of their own in recent events but not at Road America where they had to settle for a P7 in class finish.

These results sees last season’s champion (De Angelis) and Sorenson drop to second within the drivers table with a 206-point deficit to the BMW M4 GTD crew of Madison Snow and Bryan Sellars with (again) three rounds remaining.

The championship positions for both Heart crews made the result of VIR round pivotable to their respective Championship chances before the season runs itself out at both Indianapolis and Road Atlanta.

Again listed within the provisional entry list this week, sees the #94 Andretti Autosport AMR Vantage GTD of Jarred Andretti and Gabby Chaves also for VIR but they too were also listed for Road America when they didn’t actually run so we will wait to see with them.

Photo credits – Team / Series / J Price

The victory was an emotional one for the team, which did an incredible job to build-up and ship a brand new #23 Vantage GT3 to Lime Rock in less than a fortnight, following Gunn’s high-speed accident in the previous round at Mosport when a rival made contact with the Briton. The crash underlined a sequence of misfortune for the GTD Pro entry, but Saturday’s victory emphasised the pace and competitiveness that has been present all season. 

“We needed this win,” said Gunn. “The team deserves it after all the hard work we’ve put in, especially after the past two weeks, and this one is for all the guys that spent so much time in the workshop building up a new car. It’s proof of how resilient this team is. We’ve had the pace all-season long but we’ve been searching for a clean race, when everything fell into place and it’s happened here. The Vantage was awesome in qualifying and I knew, if we carried that pace into the race we were going to be strong. I’m very happy for Heart of Racing and Aston Martin, and my team-mate Alex, and I know that we can win again this season if we can take this momentum on into Road America.”

The Rolex 24 at Daytona GTD class winners – reigning champion Roman De Angelis (CAN) and co-driver LMGTE Am world champion Marco Sørensen (DEN) – driving the #27 Vantage GT3, recorded HoR and Vantage’s tenth win since introducing the car to the IMSA series fulltime in 2020. 

It was the first victory for the #27 since Daytona and was achieved after the car took the lead in the second hour, following a penalty for the championship-leading BMW. Sørensen then soaked up the pressure from two Porsches to see out the win. The victory brings the crew within 86 points of regaining the GTD class lead with four races to go in 2023.

It was the second GTD class win for Heart of Racing at Lime Rock, with the team having finished no lower than second in the last three years on the 1.5-mile circuit. The triumph also marks its second IMSA double – the first having come at Watkins Glen in 2022.

“This was another new circuit for me to learn this year, and I think it went well!” said Sørensen. “It’s a great challenge to learn all these circuits in the US. The team did another fantastic job with the strategy and the Vantage is always competitive in IMSA. We were a little lucky, and it was unfortunate for the team that got the penalty, but we’ve had our fair share of bad luck as well this season and these things often work out that way. Now we have closed the gap in the championship it’s time to turn-up the pressure and chase the title in the last four races of the year.”

Heart of Racing team principal Ian James, said: “What a day for Heart of Racing and Aston Martin. To take victory in both classes here at Lime Rock is an amazing accomplishment and down to the outstanding pit stops by the crew and faultless performance by the drivers. Racing brings highs and lows; this is one of the good days.”

The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship now moves on to Road America, for the IMSA Sportscar weekend, 3-6 August.

Source Material - AMR
Photo Credits - J Price / Team / IMSA / Michelin

The resulting spin saw his #23 GTD Pro car that he shares with Alex Riberas nose heavily into the tyre protected crash barrier before rebounded out again with extensive from end damage. Unlike the #23 car, Gunn was otherwise OK for that experience although he was ‘sore’ in places for the next couple of days.

That gave the Heart of Racing team little time to ready both the #23 and #27 AMR GTD car of Roman De Angelis/Marco Sorenson ahead of this weekend’s GTD only round around the small but perfectly formed Lime Rock Park circuit.

Yesterday’s Qualifying saw Gunn place his #23 onto out right pole position, beating his class by just 0.191 of a second around the 1.4-mile circuit.

In GTD, the #23 car couldn’t replicate the success of CTMP when De Angelis claimed class pole position there, but they will be starting todays 100 minute from the second row of the GTD grid in P4 whilst the #94 Andretti Motorsport AMR of Jarrett Andretti and Gabby Chaves start P12.

Photo credits – Teams / Series / J Price

Also competing amongst the GTD only event will be the return of the #94 Andretti Autosport AMR Vantage GTD of Jarett Andretti and Gabby Chaves. Not seen within their Aston Martin since their ill-fated debut with the car at Laguna Seca where Andretti was taken out of the race by a racing room deficient prototype.

After that and a hard hit into the tyre wall for the #23 car of Ross Gunn at CTMP, hopefully this weekend’s results will mirror those of last year too!

Then in Michelin Pilot Challenge – there will be no GS class cars at all as the TCR class get the race all to themselves as the GT4 based cars did likewise earlier in the year at Detroit.

Rounding off the weekend will be a further two races within the new for 2023 VP Fuels Sportscar Challenge Series where we do not see the usual Aston Martin Racing attendees of Todd Coleman and Moisey Uretsky aboard their usual Archangel and Accelerating performance prepared GSX class cars – but we do see the #09 Stoner Car Care Aston Martin Vantage GT4 of Rob Ecklin hit the series for the first time.

A long-time advocate of the Michelin Pilot Challenge Series, the Automatic Racing prepared crew have been going something ‘off piste’ this season in lieu of just another year within the IMSA sanctioned series, doing what they like – where and when and this is just another example of it.

Racing for all the three IMSA series around the tight and twisty 1.5-mile circuit will be fast and furious for as long as the Safety Car cab be kept within pit lane. We wish them all well.

Photo credits – Teams / Series / J Price

Also featuring within the GTD grid of thirty-eight cars were the #44 AMR from the Magnus Racing team as John Potter and Andy Lally looked for seat time ahead of the Championship’s next round of the Endurance Cup at Watkins Glen at the end of June as well as the first competitive running of the new #94 Andretti Autosport AMR of Jarrett Andretti and Gabby Chaves. These latter two crews would struggle during early track sessions and qualifying to start the race from the rear in P16 and P13 respectively.

With Sunday’s race programme being disrupted by untimely morning fog, early morning warm up eventually got underway but with Race Control having to remain somewhat ‘fluid’ to keep the schedule on track ahead of its afternoon live TV slot.

Competing within a field of GTP and LMP2 cars, the staggered grid eventually got away with the #27 car of De Angelis picking off a car to grab P2 overall in class by the exit of the first corner whilst Riberas maintained his position. Early contact between two GTD’s within the mid-field brought out the Safety Car with only two minutes race time on the clock but once the race went back to green, the #94 car of Andretti would be seen recovering from an unchallenged spin.

However, just a further ten minutes into their Aston Martin/IMSA debut, the #94 would then be seen getting a nudge from a passing GTP that would send the American heavily into the tyre wall at pit entrance – bringing out the Safety Car again and bringing about their immediate retirement as well. Thankfully Andretti was otherwise unhurt but at least he would be cleared of any wrongdoing as the #7 Porsche would be later sanctioned by Race Control.

With the pit lane opening this time, both Heart cars pitted for tyres and fuel but dropped track position as a consequence as the third Safety Car was called at the hour mark for an LMP2 car in the gravel and tyre wall.

By the time the race went back to green this time around, the #23 car of Riberas had now claimed top position in GTD Pro, with the #27 car in P8 and with the #44 car upon the cusp of a top ten position in GTD.

Just over an hour to go and all three remaining Aston Martin cars pitted for the final time as Gunn took over the #23, Sorensen the #27 and (slightly earlier) Lally the #44 cars.

Ten minutes later, another Safety Car for a stricken GTD Pro car at the final corner. What happened next was extremely ‘odd’ as the #23 car was seen to be driving extremely slowly to a point of cars behind deciding whether to pass it or not within the ongoing Safety Car train! What that turned out to be was the first inklings of a mistake from the Heart team in getting the #23 car to pass on the wave around – incorrectly it then transpired with the slowing an attempt to make amends for that pit wall error.

Unfortunately for the #23 car, that error came with a mighty price as Gunn was soon instructed to park up for a stop and hold that would lose them the class lead and two further laps as a consequence.

That left little over half an hour for the #44 car to maintain its GTD class lead after having unassumingly taken that position despite being listed as visiting pit lane five times over the usual three from their peers around them. As the laps counted down, the tyre degradation was beginning to show and one by one, the four cars stacked up behind Lally passed his car for position.

Having battled it hard to the end, the #44 car would finish just off the GTD podium in forth whilst the #27 had never recovered from the second Safety Car period to finish a disappointed P8 with the #23 being relegated to last in class after being passed by the equally culpable Corvette in the dying stages of the race.

With now just over a month until the next round at Watkins Glen, that gives the teams enough time to analyse what exactly went on at Laguna Seca and prepare themselves for the next round!

Photo credits – Jamie Price / Teams / AMR

Full season entries from the Heart of Racing team re-join forces with their base crew after several weeks away racing in the World Endurance Championship, British GT and the 24 Series in Europe for their two GTD Pro and GTD class entries for their #23 and #27 AMR Vantage GTD cars respectively.

Competing within another sizeable, mixed class grid of thirty-eight cars, the #23 GTD Pro car of Ross Gunn and Alex Riberas will again do battle with four other cars whilst the #27 GTD entry of Roman de Angelis and Marco Sorenson will not be alone as the only AMR in class.

Usually an Endurance Cup entry, the #44 Magnus Racing AMR of John Potter and Andy Lally return for the first time since Sebring, but they also get joined by the series debuting #94 Andretti Autosport AMR Vantage GTD entry for drivers Jarett Andretti and Gabby Chaves.

No strangers to the demands of modern motor racing of course, sees the Andretti turn to the GTD for the first time in which is listed as being a selective race IMSA programme for this normally LMP3 powered crew.

Within the Championship standings, the #23 crew of Gunn/Riberas presently lie in fifth after something of a difficult start to the season at the two endurance openers in Florida but with still eight rounds to go, there is still plenty of scope to progress. The #27 crew of De Angelis/Sorenson however, come straight off the back of an impressive class win at Long Beach which lifts them into second place within the GTD class.

Official track action gets underway on Friday with the first Free Practice session with Qualifying scheduled for late afternoon, early evening on Saturday before a green flag to the race at 15:10hrs local on Sunday.

Photo credits – Teams