IMSA 2019

Doc Austin said:
I always hate the Long Beach weekend because we tear up a bunch of good cars for no reason other than we need to be there for "prestige." People are either there to party or to see Indycars. I seriously doubt we pick up even one new fan because of Long Beach and we always end up scorching a bunch of money the teams can't afford on stupid accidents. I will be happy if I am wrong this time though.

What I would much rather see us have them race somewhere like VIR, or even better, restore the old 4th of July night race.

While I am complaining, will we have more than 2 P2 cars this weekend?

Aside from that, it's always great to see the prototypes run no matter where it's at. If they can have a reasonably clean race, it's going to be a great one.
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It's a good crowd at Long Beach, I wouldn't mind the series at Portland or Utah Motorsports Campus (although I doubt they get anything more than Blancpain World Challenge).
 
My DVR missed the race so I only saw the last 10 minutes. Looked like a wild race.

Man, the Ford GTs sure self destructed at the end, didn't they?
 
DVR cut off the last half of the race so I just finished watching online today. Wow - this might be the most fun road racing series on the planet right now.

Doc Austin said:
I also didn't see a single P2 car. Were there any even there?
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No P2s last weekend and they won't be at Detroit either.
 
Doc Austin said:
When you stop taking care of the privateers, it's the beginning of the end.
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Four privateer entries in DPi though. It looks stupid now but the split was preferred by the LMP2 runners, except the biggest proponents of the split (JDC-Miller) announced they'd run Cadillacs literally days after IMSA announced the change. Performance Tech and PR1-Mathiasen being in their own class is not much of a loss because they were the more expendable of the privateers anyways.

I'd say when they debut DPi 2.0 in 2022, if they really need a dedicated Pro-Am prototype class, bring in the 2020-2024 LMP3 cars. Faster and safer so they should be separated from the GTs to a larger extent.

100 minutes on a street course can't be good value for the LMP2s either. I think they wanted those two races cut out of their schedule, based upon how it was announced.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Four privateer entries in DPi though.
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There would be no Nissan privateer unless ESM went bust, and they were essentially a privateer anyway. That car was not made available to anyone until there was no one else to run it. As for the other privateers, thanks to Cadillac for stepping up and providing cars. Mazda and Acura won't sell cars for any price, which I believe is wrong.

I'de like to see them run the P2 cars with the P3 cars. They do that in ELMS and they had 30 something full time P entries this year. The grids were beautiful!
 
Doc Austin said:
There would be no Nissan privateer unless ESM went bust, and they were essentially a privateer anyway. That car was not made available to anyone until there was no one else to run it. As for the other privateers, thanks to Cadillac for stepping up and providing cars. Mazda and Acura won't sell cars for any price, which I believe is wrong.

I'de like to see them run the P2 cars with the P3 cars. They do that in ELMS and they had 30 something full time P entries this year. The grids were beautiful!
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ESM were definitely a privateer, they just had an exclusivity agreement with Nissan, the conclusion of which coincided with the end of their program. Anyone can run Nissan entries now. I agree Mazda and Acura should offer customer cars but Acura also have an exclusivity deal with Penske (which may or may not expire at the end of this year) and Mazda have had some discussions with teams but first and foremost they want to figure out their factory effort.
 
Ford confirmed the end of the factory GT program after this year. However, they still anticipate the cars running in customer hands (the first customer GT runs at Le Mans in two months) in both the WEC and in IMSA after this year, with a level of support from Ford. There have been lots of reports regarding a possible Ford DPi program in 2020, but with DPi 2.0 set to debut in 2022 with hybrid powertrains I think they might hold off on entering the top class until then.

https://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/ford-confirms-end-of-factory-gt-program/
 
Well, I am gleefully wrong about my prediction that Long Beach would be a carnage. Not sure how bad the Taylor car got it, but the Ford GTs took the brunt of the abuse. Still, we've seen a lot worse here and this was a relatively clean race. Can't wait for the next one!
 
Ryan Hunter-Reay in one of the Mazdas for Harry Tincknell this coming weekend. Also, first race of the Sprint Cup for GTD.

D5RQBcYWsAA1SBY.jpg:large
 
Sorry missed this.

FLRacingFan said:
I'd say when they debut DPi 2.0 in 2022, if they really need a dedicated Pro-Am prototype class, bring in the 2020-2024 LMP3 cars. Faster and safer so they should be separated from the GTs to a larger extent.
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In the ELMS, they run the P2s and P3s together. Last time I looked, they had a 35 prototype full season grid! If we did something like this, we could have DPI and DPI "light," almost like we had in the GTP days.

Look at this grid. Plenty of prototypes and just enough GTs to get in the way!

elms-spielberg-2017-22-g-drive-racing-oreca-07-gibson-memo-rojas-nicolas-minassian-leo-rou-5656286.jpg
 
Doc Austin said:
Sorry missed this.

In the ELMS, they run the P2s and P3s together. Last time I looked, they had a 35 prototype full season grid! If we did something like this, we could have DPI and DPI "light," almost like we had in the GTP days.

Look at this grid. Plenty of prototypes and just enough GTs to get in the way!

elms-spielberg-2017-22-g-drive-racing-oreca-07-gibson-memo-rojas-nicolas-minassian-leo-rou-5656286.jpg
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The new LMP3 cars are also cost-capped at €239,000 while the current LMP2 cars (no idea what LMP2 will look like in the future yet) are capped at €480,000 - so literally half as expensive to buy and probably cheaper to run as well. There are also 24 cars on the Mid-Ohio LMP3 entry list so it's certainly a formula that's growing and that works. I think if IMSA really wanted to, they could find a way to integrate LMP3 into the WeatherTech Championship without wiping out the PC series.
 
FLRacingFan said:
The new LMP3 cars are also cost-capped at €239,000 while the current LMP2 cars (no idea what LMP2 will look like in the future yet) are capped at €480,000 - so literally half as expensive to buy and probably cheaper to run as well. There are also 24 cars on the Mid-Ohio LMP3 entry list so it's certainly a formula that's growing and that works. I think if IMSA really wanted to, they could find a way to integrate LMP3 into the WeatherTech Championship without wiping out the PC series.
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Uhhhh, wait. Isn't PC already gone, or do you mean the Mazda Prototype challenge? I always though they should have integrated PC into the Mazda challenge and moved the P3s into Weather Tech.

And still, the kind of money you are talking, everyone sure let the costs get out of hand, didn't they?
 
Doc Austin said:
Uhhhh, wait. Isn't PC already gone, or do you mean the Mazda Prototype challenge? I always though they should have integrated PC into the Mazda challenge and moved the P3s into Weather Tech.

And still, the kind of money you are talking, everyone sure let the costs get out of hand, didn't they?
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Yeah, the Prototype Challenge. They phased out the MPCs after last year so it's just LMP3 cars there now.
 
FLRacingFan said:
They phased out the MPCs after last year.
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I hated those dick nose things! The broadcast would follow them around and we would miss half the P3 action.


so it's just LMP3 cars there now.
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I have not had a chance to see that series this year. For some weird reason my DVR won't pick it up. I'll bet it's pretty terrific.
 
Hey, thanks. Don't forget Spa WEC is this weekend on Motor Trend TV. Sadly Dragon Speed couldn't get their P1 car fixed in time to make the show. I hope the new rules tweaks give the privateers some equal footing, or at least enough that they can make a race out of it.
 
OK, let's get the rain out of here. We passed on practice today at Mid Ohio, but are hoping to go Saturday and Sunday for some awesome road racing!
 
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