The first privateer IMSA GTP made its competition debut this past weekend: A Porsche 963 fielded by JDC-Miller MotorSports, with drivers Mike Rockenfeller and Tijmen van der Helm at the wheel. Why does that matter? We asked IMSA president John Doonan that very question.
“From the day that Bill France and John Bishop founded IMSA, it was founded on the ideal that …
All in all, it was a very good debut for a team that only had the car for 10 days. The future of the GTP class is promising.
Yeah to only be a second off the best lap of the winning team is "not bad" on your first outing.
Indeed. They were steadily gaining speed over the course of the day. A lot of their "issues," if you want to call them that, were from just being a new team. For example, understanding what the tires will do over the course of a run. The car was the one thing that was solid.
Great to see such a young guy emerge in GTP. I read just 19.years old. Looked him up, world champion in go-kart. Had a difficult year in F3 and switched to prototypes last year. Great pace, 4th in Le Mans. Matched Rocky, with only 50 minutes of practice with new car and new track. Bring in some more new young guys.
And, FWIW, from what I hear, the backend of the new GTP cars is wicked complicated. To come in and be only a second off the pace sounds pretty impressive.
Looking forward to more customer teams. It’s how Porsche filled the GTP field back in the day.
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