IMSA 2019

For the benefit of those of us who aren't familiar with all the internationally specified classes, what's the difference between DPi and LMP2? And is DPi based on another standard?

Thanks in advance!
 
Charlie Spencer said:
For the benefit of those of us who aren't familiar with all the internationally specified classes, what's the difference between DPi and LMP2? And is DPi based on another standard?

Thanks in advance!
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DPi is actually based off of LMP2 - the four approved LMP2 chassis constructors are Dallara, Ligier, ORECA, and Multimatic and each of them are affiliated with an OEM for DPi - Dallara/Cadillac, Ligier/Nissan, ORECA/Acura, and Multimatic/Mazda (good chance Ford joins DPi with Multimatic in 2020 as well). Chassis and bodywork are largely the same across the two platforms, with some allowances for chassis development and aero styling cues. LMP2 uses a spec V8 engine, obviously replaced in DPi with whatever a certain OEM feels like using. LMP2 is transitioning to a Pro-Am class in IMSA this year, being slowed down a bit while the DPi restrictions have been loosened a little bit as BoP was becoming difficult to manage considering one is development-free while manufacturers kept developing on the other end.
 
FLRacingFan said:
And I thought John Paul Sr. was a bad dude...
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Paul sr only shot a government witness in the head five times and left him to die (which amazingly he didn't!) No big deal! He escaped from prison by throwing acid in a guard's face, and then disappeared. I don't know if he has been caught or not.

Really pulling for the CORE Nissan. They came so close to the championship and are probably the last true privateer fighting for overall victory. It's going to be a great race and I almost don't care who wins because all the cars are cool. Guess I am pulling for the Nissan a little since that's what we drive at home.

That, or a wet race with super carnage and attrition that allows a P2 car to win. That would be like Rocky.

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But, if you can't stand any negativity, stop reading now. I'm usually really positive about the series, but I don't like splitting the DP and P2 cars into separate classes. I don't really care about the three car P2 class because they have no chance to win. Splitting the classes didn't help the car count and it only succeeded in locking the privateers out of the overall win. They may not even have three P2s in future races, so once again we have the privateers not being taken care of.

This would not be so bad if you could actually buy a DPI, and Cadillac has really stepped up this year providing cars. Still, there were only so many of them available. What's not fair is if you are a privateer, that's your only choice, and Cadillac can't be expected to supply the entire field. You can't buy a Mazda or an Acura for any money, Caddy probably doesn't have any more cars available, and I don't believe there were ever more than two Nissan in existence (and core may have bought them both anyway. Am I forgetting any?

If you are a privateer, you just about can't buy a car that can win in a straight fight. Privateer P2 cars were a great supplement to the prototype grid, with the bonus of being more competitive cars in the field. Now they are choked down to their own sub class that even IMSA is suggesting might feature less than three cars outside of the enduros. I can't imagine beating two other cars and feeling like you have done something, or worse, finishing third and standing on the podium taking a trophy for essentially last place. Participation trophy! Yea, me!

Privateers will get tired of that too and go somewhere they can race competitively. like maybe GT Daytona where you can actually buy a competitive car.

I think if they had left it alone and gave the P2 their own privateer championship, while still allowing them to race for the overall, we would not have lost a few of last year's P2 cars, and with the chance to win others may have joined. I hope I am wrong and they find a way to make P2 thrive, but I do believe it would be better if they went back to last year's program, let everyone race heads up, and gave the privateers their own trophy, and the manufacturer's theirs with and overall champion.
 
IMSA needs more race weekends. I don't want to wait a month until Sebring. They need a race every other week at a minimum. Ok, I'm just being selfish, but seriously, I'm having racing withdrawals already after the Daytona 24.
 
LouieLouie said:
IMSA needs more race weekends. I don't want to wait a month until Sebring. They need a race every other week at a minimum. Ok, I'm just being selfish, but seriously, I'm having racing withdrawals already after the Daytona 24.
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I know what you mean but the teams are already stretched pretty thin, and this stuff is expensive. Right now about the only thing missing is prototypes at VIR and I'de love to see the Daytona July night race come back. Outside of that, I think all of the really good tracks are covered. We don't need more crashfests like Long Beach.
 
Doc Austin said:
I know what you mean but the teams are already stretched pretty thin, and this stuff is expensive. Right now about the only thing missing is prototypes at VIR and I'de love to see the Daytona July night race come back. Outside of that, I think all of the really good tracks are covered. We don't need more crashfests like Long Beach.
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Yeah, I think the only major road course in America missing from the schedule is COTA, and that event flopped. Pretty much everything besides F1 and MotoGP has flopped there.

Sure does create a lot of anticipation though. That Super Sebring week has the potential to be epic. When they opened sales last fall their day 1 sales were something crazy like 300% of what they were on day 1 of 2018 sales.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Yeah, I think the only major road course in America missing from the schedule is COTA, and that event flopped. Pretty much everything besides F1 and MotoGP has flopped there.
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I'd love to see them run Barber in Birmingham as a double with IndyCar, instead of Long Beach a week later. I don't know why, but LB does nothing for me. Then again, neither does any other street course.
 
FLRacingFan said:
Yeah, I think the only major road course in America missing from the schedule is COTA, and that event flopped. Pretty much everything besides F1 and MotoGP has flopped there.

Sure does create a lot of anticipation though. That Super Sebring week has the potential to be epic. When they opened sales last fall their day 1 sales were something crazy like 300% of what they were on day 1 of 2018 sales.
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I read the old GRC now called American Rallycross I believe is going to race at the COTA. I'm interested in what kind of course they will come up with and the crowd they will draw.
 
COTA stinks. The track design is a disaster that leads to limited passing areas. That's why events flop there.
 
Charlie Spencer said:
I'd love to see them run Barber in Birmingham as a double with IndyCar, instead of Long Beach a week later. I don't know why, but LB does nothing for me. Then again, neither does any other street course.
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Forgot about Barber. They still had Pirelli World Challenge not too long ago, but that series views itself more as a feature than a companion now and is moving on to bigger and possibly better things, and I thought the racing there was pretty good. Long Beach is a huge race for exposure for the series and manufacturers, which is why they still go there - even though the crash bills sometimes add up. Same for Detroit, which is a huge showcase for GM (even though Corvette can't compete there, the Corvette DP formerly did and Cadillac does now).
 
Pretty bad one at Bathurst

IMSA driver/owner Pappas suffers fractures in Bathurst 12H crash
fans-near-black-swan-racing-po-1.jpg


https://racer.com/2019/02/01/imsa-driver-owner-pappas-suffers-fractures-in-bathurst-12h-crash/
 
StandOnIt said:
My opinion is the the COTA is not treacherous enough, it looks too easy to drive to me, not enough penalty if a driver screws up.
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LouieLouie said:
COTA stinks. The track design is a disaster that leads to limited passing areas. That's why events flop there.
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For IndyCar's sake hopefully they find a way to put on a good show there because that's a five-year contract they have starting this year. It's a bit clunky so I think that's why WEC and IMSA never really had a memorable show there, maybe IndyCar will suit it better.
 
FLRacingFan said:
For IndyCar's sake hopefully they find a way to put on a good show there because that's a five-year contract they have starting this year. It's a bit clunky so I think that's why WEC and IMSA never really had a memorable show there, maybe IndyCar will suit it better.
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Indycar will put on a good show, but COTA's problem is that it's not a real race track. You can slide off 50 feet and not run out of pavement. There's no physically defined limits, They may as well have drawn lines on the road to establish bounderies......of, wait.........that's exactly what they did. I think in the whole time they have been running F1 at COTA I've never seen a car damaged except in a collision. Toy fly off the track, there's nothing to hit, and you rejoin without losing any time.

It's pure crap. safety has become so important no race track can have any sting or challenge.
 
Doc Austin said:
Indycar will put on a good show, but COTA's problem is that it's not a real race track. You can slide off 50 feet and not run out of pavement. There's no physically defined limits, They may as well have drawn lines on the road to establish bounderies......of, wait.........that's exactly what they did. I think in the whole time they have been running F1 at COTA I've never seen a car damaged except in a collision. Toy fly off the track, there's nothing to hit, and you rejoin without losing any time.

It's pure crap. safety has become so important no race track can have any sting or challenge.
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I don’t agree with this. I believe the bigger issue is not being too safe or Monaco would be the most exciting race on the F1 calendar.

The real issue is it is kind of a clunky track honestly meant to be technical for the best handling race cars in the world. Did an iracing thing there and while the long straights were nice for a slipstream, there were a lot of times where you’re just kinda riding through the winding parts of it. It doesn’t have a lot of flow to it
 
Mispeedway15 said:
I don’t agree with this. I believe the bigger issue is not being too safe or Monaco would be the most exciting race on the F1 calendar.

The real issue is it is kind of a clunky track honestly meant to be technical for the best handling race cars in the world. Did an iracing thing there and while the long straights were nice for a slipstream, there were a lot of times where you’re just kinda riding through the winding parts of it. It doesn’t have a lot of flow to it
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Lack of passing opportunities and braking zones?
 
Charlie Spencer said:
Lack of passing opportunities and braking zones?
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I think the number of braking zones is fine, but the third sector in particular is really slow and clunky, with not much opportunity to really pass or even set something up (maybe into the final corner). The esses are REALLY long too but at least through there you're setting something up for turn 11 or 12. I do think the super long backstretch could be interesting though, should pass the front straight at Road America as the fastest part of a road course in IndyCar.
 
Interesting stuff. In the MPC race at Sebring next weekend, the two Multimatic Mustangs usually used recently for young drivers like Cindric/Briscoe/Custer/Majeski are now featuring ThorSport drivers - Ben Rhodes and Myatt Snider in the #13 and Matt Crafton and Grant Enfinger in the #22. A big surprise but probably a good move by Ford considering how important Mosport is now.

Anyways, a couple of pretty good fields - 38 for the 12 Hours, and 43 for MPC.

https://competitors.imsa.com/sites/...wnloads/sebring_iwsc_pre-event_entry_list.pdf

https://competitors.imsa.com/sites/...wnloads/sebring_impc_pre-event_entry_list.pdf
 
Maybe both of them will burst into flames on the pace lap. You can't fake entertainment.

It's really quite baffling to see Joest struggle so much. Maybe they need to just suck it up up and have Gibson badge a motor for them. Mazda deserves better than the beating they are taking.Really, they are throwing everything at it and getting nothing in return but TV screens all over the country lighting up with Mazda blazes. Doesn't exactly sell cars on Monday.

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.
 
Last weekend at Barber was the one to double up with Indy. I don't like street courses, and I dislike Long Beach the most.
 
Doc Austin said:
Maybe both of them will burst into flames on the pace lap. You can't fake entertainment.

It's really quite baffling to see Joest struggle so much. Maybe they need to just suck it up up and have Gibson badge a motor for them. Mazda deserves better than the beating they are taking.Really, they are throwing everything at it and getting nothing in return but TV screens all over the country lighting up with Mazda blazes. Doesn't exactly sell cars on Monday.

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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Really the only races that have been messy there recently had either PC or GTD cars, so either just too many cars total or too many amateurs. But it's DPi/GTLM-only this weekend.
 
For example, when a funded silver-rated driver tries to go three-wide at the hairpin. Not great, Bob!



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Watching on DVR now.

Pinhead move by Bomarito. Two races in a row now where he's made uncharacteristic mistakes to help take Mazda out of contention.
 
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