DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – In a year where “streaks” stole the spotlight early in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season, parity has now permeated the Grand Touring Daytona Pro (GTD PRO) class through six of 10 rounds.
In its fourth season, GTD PRO continues to deliver a variety of competition, drama and excellence in WeatherTech Championship races. No one manufacturer has stolen the march.
Leaving Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Ford, Porsche, BMW and now Ferrari have won races, while Chevrolet leads both the driver and manufacturer championships and nine of the 10 full-season entries have scored at least one podium finish.
In fact, these four brands have won the last four races with Porsche (WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca), Ford (Streets of Detroit), BMW (Watkins Glen International) and Ferrari (CTMP) showcasing the diversity of victories.
To add to the performance success, all four winners have had revised lineups or team structures in 2025. Porsche’s now got Klaus Bachler in for the full season alongside Laurin Heinrich at AO Racing. Ford has welcomed Seb Priaulx, alongside the experienced Mike Rockenfeller, to one of its two cars.
Paul Miller Racing BMW’s brought in IMSA newcomers Dan Harper and Max Hesse to the team’s new second car. And Ferrari has seen DragonSpeed and Risi Competizione mesh almost seamlessly in their first seasons together with Albert Costa and a rotation of co-drivers, most frequently Giacomo Altoe.
The Costa/Altoe pairing broke through for a fortuitous, if well-executed, last-to-first fuel save special to win in GTD PRO ahead of Chevrolet in Sunday’s Chevrolet Grand Prix.
“Considering everyone has their rhythm and style and work. I’ve been surprised how well we’ve matched,” Costa said going into Watkins Glen.
He also explained how he’s handled working with Altoe, Davide Rigon, Rasmus Lindh, Thomas Neubauer and Miguel Molina as co-drivers at any point in the No. 81 Ferrari 296 GT3.
“With Giacomo we know each other well, as we’d worked together for four years,” Costa explained. “With Davide, we are almost a perfect couple. Now from Sebring to (Watkins Glen) we hadn’t seen each other. But we speak a lot on our WhatsApp group talking seat insert, pit stops and more.
“When Giacomo had a problem before Detroit, we had to push a lot with Rasmus to learn a quick pit stop, vs. his coming from LMP2 (Le Mans Prototype 2) which is completely different. It’s not easy but you try to maximize the situation as best as you can.”
Championship points leaders Antonio Garcia and Alexander Sims in the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R finished fourth at CTMP, ending their run of three straight podiums.
Although they’ve not won, their consistency has kept them ahead of their rivals so far. A No. 3 Corvette has won an IMSA title without a win before; Garcia and Jan Magnussen pulled it off in 2018 in the former GT Le Mans class.
“It was super difficult strategy-wise to know what to do,” Garcia said. “You would do whatever you had to do and it obviously went the other way for us. In a way, I’m happy that we did our race. Without the last yellow, everyone ahead of us was tight (on fuel) so it was going to be another fight with the 77.”
In all through six races, Ford and Porsche have two wins apiece with BMW and Ferrari winning the last two.
Despite no wins, the two Corvettes have combined for five podiums. Lamborghini also has both a pole and a podium this year with manufacturer newcomers Pfaff Motorsports. Poor luck more than anything has plagued Lexus, whose No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing RC F GT3 has a best finish of fourth as Aaron Telitz had a rotating lineup of co-drivers in the wake of Ben Barnicoat’s early-season injury.
With four races remaining, it’s anyone’s guess who’s going to emerge on top of the championship.
The No. 3 Corvette lost 20 points to the No. 77 AO Porsche that finished third. But Garcia and Sims still lead defending GTD PRO champion Heinrich and Bachler by 39 points in the championship.
Racing the No. 77 car was the team’s strategy on Sunday, and the sister No. 4 Corvette secured Chevrolet valuable manufacturer’s championship points by finishing ahead in second at CTMP behind the No. 81 Ferrari. Costa ranks third on his own, only 53 points behind the championship-leading duo.
The Harper/Hesse and Rockenfeller/Priaulx pairings aren’t out of it either – both within 200 points – but will need to make some headway in the next two sprint rounds to have a more realistic shot for the final two rounds in IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup events.
Chevrolet’s lead in the manufacturer championship is a little more solid, with a 67-point gap to Porsche. Ferrari is third, a further 12 points behind and BMW fourth, four more back.
Ferrari won at Road America last year with a guest entry from Conquest Racing, with BMW (VIRginia International Raceway), Porsche (Indianapolis Motor Speedway) and Lamborghini (Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta) winning the final four races.
History may be about to repeat itself in terms of continued parity.