LMP2 Headliner, Intense Championship Battles and Canadian Contenders
By David Phillips
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – And now for something completely different . . .
This weekend’s Chevrolet Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park (CTMP) is not just the 2025 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s lone visit to Canada, it’s also the only time the spotlight will shine on the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category this season. With the exotic Grand Touring Prototypes (GTP) enjoying a weekend off, it’s up to the LMP2 drivers, teams and machinery to set the pace on one of North America’s most challenging road courses.
Not that the LMP2 competitors will have the curves and corners, hills and dales of CTMP to themselves. Far from it. In addition to a dozen LMP2s, the entry list includes a total of 23 Grand Touring Daytona (GTD) sports cars in the GTD PRO (10 cars) and GTD (13) categories.
That’s an important point, for while prototypes’ swoopy bodywork, wings and under-bodies will pin them to the tarmac as they negotiate CTMP’s numerous high-speed turns, out on the long Mario Andretti Straightaway there will be little to choose between the top speeds of the LMP2s and the GTDs. That portends for two hours and 40 minutes of exciting action as the field jousts for their rightful chunk of real estate around the 10-turn, 2.459-mile track.
LMP2 Headliner
It’s only right that one of the WeatherTech Championship’s fastest growing classes gets its weekend in the spotlight. Just a few years ago, LMP2 entries typically numbered in the single digits, around six cars. Today’s LMP2 category typically doubles those numbers, often on par with and sometimes featuring more than their GTP and GTD PRO colleagues.
And while the No. 22 United Autosports USA’s ORECA LMP2 07 and drivers Daniel Goldburg, Paul Di Resta and Rasmus Lindh have scored two wins in three races to date, as testimony to the highly competitive nature of the category, consider that no fewer than seven other cars have visited an LMP2 podium in 2025.
So far.
As well as taking the spotlight this weekend, the LMP2 competitors will be tackling their first sprint race of the campaign after consuming a steady diet of endurance events (the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring and the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen) prior to their visit to CTMP.
Last year’s CTMP sprint was a real cracker of race, one that saw Nick Boulle and Tom Dillmann in the No. 52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen ORECA defeat Gar Robinson and Felipe Fraga in the No. 74 Riley ORECA for the win by a scant 0.658 of a second with the top four finishers all covered by little more than five seconds.
Now running independently, Inter Europol has a Sebring win and seeks a CTMP encore victory with Dillmann and team newcomer Jeremy Clarke, while PR1 Mathiasen with its revised lineup of Mathias Beche and Rodrigo Sales seeks their first win of the year. Equally, United Autosports USA will be out to better last year’s results in Canada which saw its No. 2 ORECA finish fourth and the sister No. 22 car fifth.
Championship Battles Heating Up
Now that the thermometer seems to have taken up permanent residence in the 80s and 90s Fahrenheit (or in the high 20s to low 30s Celsius), the WeatherTech Championship points battles are heating up as well. Witness the fact that the LMP2 and GTD PRO class points leaders changed at the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen and the battle for the GTD points lead tightened considerably.
As matters stand heading to CTMP, the No. 22 United Autosports USA ORECA and drivers Goldburg, Di Resta and Lindh lead the No. 74 Riley ORECA of Robinson, Fraga and Josh Burdon by 94 points.
But the driver standings are bound to experience another shake-up at CTMP for two reasons. This is the first IMSA sprint race of the year for LMP2, so each car runs only two drivers rather than three. Additionally, several other IMSA regulars will miss the weekend owing to scheduling conflicts.
Goldburg will contest the race with veteran Tom Blomqvist, and John Farano will have Renger van der Zande join him in the No. 8 Tower Motorsports ORECA. Robinson and Fraga are among the full-season LMP2 regulars set to tackle CTMP’s many challenges without the need to integrate a part-timer into their lineup.
Over in GTD PRO, the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette Z06 GT3.R has ridden a wave of consistency to the top of the standings with four podiums in five races. Antonio Garcia and Alexander Sims now lead defending class champion Laurin Heinrich and co-driver Klaus Bachler in AO Racing’s No. 77 Porsche 911 GT3 R by 52 points. Just eight points covers the contest for third place among the No. 81 DragonSpeed Ferrari 296 GT3, the No. 64 Ford Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3 and the No. 48 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVO.
Although Winward Racing still leads the GTD standings after the No. 57 Mercedes-AMG GT3 was caught-up in an accident at Watkins Glen, the team and drivers Russell Ward and Philip Ellis saw their championship lead virtually cut in half after arriving at the Glen with a 124-point advantage. They now lead the Sahlen’s Six Hours-winning No. 27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo and driver Casper Stevenson by 60 points, with the No. 12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 of Jack Hawksworth and Parker Thompson another 16 points in arrears.
Oh Canada!
No fewer than nine drivers and three teams competing this weekend will be making a homecoming trip of sorts.
Vancouver’s Chris Cumming (No. 73 Pratt and Miller Motorsports ORECA), Torontonian John Farano (No. 8 Tower Motorsports ORECA), Montreal’s Phil Fayer (No. 2 United Autosports USA ORECA) and Ottawa’s Travis Hill (No. 18 Tower Motorsports ORECA) will represent the Maple Leaf in LMP2. The latter two make their WeatherTech Championship debuts.
Meanwhile Belle River, Ontario’s Roman De Angelis (No. 27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo), Etobicoke, Ontario’s Orey Fidani (No. 13 AWA Motorsports Corvette Z06 GT3.R), North Vancouver’s Misha Goikhberg (No. 78 Forte Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2), Red Deer, Alberta’s Parker Thompson (No.12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3) and Guelph, Ontario’s Robert Wickens (No. 36 DXDT Racing Corvette Z06 GT3.R) will be on home asphalt in GTD.
Among teams, the No. 9 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 of Toronto-based Pfaff Motorsports, the Markham, Ontario-based No. 64 and 65 Ford Mustang GT3s of Ford Multimatic Motorsports and No. 13 Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Caledon, Ontario-based AWA will also be competing this weekend. The AWA car will reprise its resplendent Canadian flag livery run at Le Mans, while Pfaff’s plaid Lamborghini will also be a crowd-pleaser.
In other words, there’s every likelihood the strains of “Oh Canada” will be echoing around the hills of CTMP come Sunday afternoon.
Be sure and catch all the action on IMSA.TV, Peacock and the USA Network as well as IMSA Radio.