BRASELTON, Ga. – At Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta Thursday (Oct. 12), IMSA held their annual State of the Sport address in the track’s Podium Club. While the event was technically postponed from Road America in August, there were plenty of good things to be said.
First off, IMSA released the 2024 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship full-season entry list. 48 teams have declared their intentions to run full-time in the four classes. They are joined by five other teams that have committed to the full Michelin Endurance Cup.
The GTP class will have 10 full-time entries, up from eight in 2023. JDC-Miller MotorSports and Proton Competition, both of whom joined the grid late due to delays receiving their new customer Porsche 963s, will be back full-time.
Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport has already announced their intention to expand to two cars in 2024, which will replace the entry lost from Meyer Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian focusing on INDYCAR. That new car will be the No. 40 and will be shared by Louis Deletraz and Jordan Taylor.
A part-time 11th entry will be the new factory Lamborghini SC63 from Iron Lynx.
There will be 11 full-time LMP2 teams in 2024. United Autosports will join the grid with two cars after the FIA World Endurance Championship announced their intention to drop LMP2 from the series with the exception of Le Mans.
Both Sean Creech Motorsports and Riley Motorsports will move up from LMP3 to join the class. Riley will field an ORECA 07, while SCM will field the only Ligier JS P217 on the grid.
AO Racing will expand into the class with a new effort of their own that will run the No. 99. Finally, AF Corse will continue to run a part-time schedule with their No. 88.
There are 10 cars entered for the full GTD Pro season, an increase of five from this year. Corvette Racing will morph into the factory-supported Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports. Under this guise, the team will expand back to two cars.
Three teams will move up from GTD. One is the GTD championship squad from Paul Miller Racing. The advancement will allow Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow to continue driving together since if Snow were to be given an upgrade to the gold driver rating, he could not continue racing as Sellers’ teammate.
The Porsche entries from AO Racing and Kellymoss with Riley’s No. 92 will also move up to the GTD Pro class. AO Racing’s car will change numbers from No. 80 to No. 77.
Finally, you have the new Ford Multimatic Motorsports factory team that will race the new Ford Mustang GT3 teams. The four full-time Mustang drivers were revealed to the public Friday at the track.
GTD has 17 full-time teams for 2023. A couple of teams from Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS will make the switch to IMSA. One team is Conquest Racing, which fielded a Ferrari 296 GT3 this year for former GTD champion Alessandro Balzan and Manny Franco.
With Alan Brynjolfsson choosing to step away from racing in 2024, Wright Motorsports is keeping their full-time entry, but changing the number to No. 120. That would likely mean that Adam Adelson and Elliott Skeer, who race in IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge together in order to their SRO America commitments, will likely make the move.
MDK Motorsports is back on the grid with their Porsche. They were supposed to be full-time this year, but cut their schedule back due to issues with the competitiveness of the new Porsche 911 GT3 R. In addition, Andrew Wojteczko Autosport (AWA), which currently races in LMP3, will be on the grid with two Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs.
Andretti Global will be on the grid with two GTD cars. One is the Aston Martin that has competed part-time in GTD this year under the Andretti Motorsports banner. The other car will be run in association with Wayne Taylor Racing.
IMSA plans to have 57 cars at minimum in all five Michelin Endurance Cup races in 2024. At Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta, that could result in a slight extension of the pit lane since that is three extra entries than the absolute maximum allowed for this weekend’s Motul Petit Le Mans.
Outside of the grid, IMSA announced that WeatherTech has signed a contract extension that will see the manufacturer of automotive products continue as title sponsor of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship through the end of 2030. The deal was originally set to expire after 2026.
In addition, extensions were also inked with VP Racing Fuels and Michelin. VP Racing Fuels will remain the official fuel provider for IMSA through 2030 as well as continuing as title sponsor of the VP Racing SportsCar Challenge. Michelin will remain the official tire of IMSA through 2028.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.