WTR Lamborghini Secures GTD Triumph
By Tony DiZinno
MONTEREY, Calif. – For Ford Racing at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, the more things change, the more they stay the same in the top Grand Touring class of IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.
Ten years ago in 2016 in Monterey, Ford scored a dramatic, strategic win that marked the first for the modern era for its new Ford GT in the former all-pro GT Le Mans class. A decade later, Ford has now scored its first dramatic, strategic win with its new evo version of the Ford Mustang GT3 in the all-pro Grand Touring Daytona Pro (GTD PRO) class during Sunday’s StubHub Monterey SportsCar Championship.
Frederic Vervisch and Christopher Mies did the honors aboard the No. 65 Ford Racing Ford Mustang GT3, with both drivers winning for the first time since the 2025 Rolex 24 At Daytona.
That 2016 win in the Ford GT came courtesy of a massive fuel save run authored by Richard Westbrook, sharing the car with Ryan Briscoe in a two-hour race. This win today came because Vervisch didn’t need to save fuel while most of their GTD PRO rivals did.
“We knew they were hoping for yellow; I think about 70 minutes before the end of the race, we knew they’d have to pit for fuel,” Vervisch said. “But they were still driving! We had to wait to see if they’d go into pit lane, they did, so it was a nice feeling.”
It appeared as though the win would come down to any of Nick Tandy (No. 77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R (992)), Alexander Sims (No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette Z06 GT3.R), Ben Barnicoat (No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3) and Connor De Phillippi (No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVO), in the top four spots. Combined, those four cars led the first 104 laps in the two-hour, 40-minute race.
If AO’s “Sketchy,” Corvette’s 2000 C5-R livery or PMR’s 1975 BMW CSL scheme won the race, it would have ensured one of the retro liveries would win on IMSA’s “Throwback” weekend.
And then, the reality emerged none of those cars had enough available energy to make the finish as their stints ran more than an hour, approaching 70 minutes, heading into the race’s final 10 minutes. Vervisch had pitted with just over an hour remaining, so had time in hand.
De Phillippi was first with eight minutes to go from P4, followed a lap later by Tandy, Sims and Barnicoat.
That promoted Vervisch to the lead, and although the second Corvette driven by Nicky Catsburg came close, the Dutchman was unable to pass the Belgian. Vervisch won the race by 1.277 seconds, while Catsburg and Tommy Milner came up second in the No. 4 Corvette. AO’s pair of Tandy and Harry King still grabbed the final podium spot in third.
The 2026 Ford features the aforementioned new evo kit, new team name (Ford Racing instead of Ford Multimatic Motorsports), a new livery (full blue and white compared to a dark blue, white and red) and a new full-season driver lineup in the No. 64 car (Ben Barker and Dennis Olsen instead of Mike Rockenfeller and Seb Priaulx).
As Mies explained, the strides made with the evo kit have begun to pay off in their third race, particularly at this track
“We brought our evo package for this year so it finally paid off,” Mies said. “Last year we got lapped here on pure pace. We were quite afraid something like that might happen again. But I would say after a tough start to the season, and what we thought could be a quite difficult race, we had a good result for the team.”
Catsburg and Milner’s consistency with their second podium in three races to start 2026 have propelled them into the GTD PRO championship lead. Unofficially, the No. 4 Corvette pair leads De Phillippi and Neil Verhagen by 51 points, King and Tandy by 63 and Monterey winners Vervisch and Mies by 74.
GTD: Hindman, Formal Break Run of Poor Luck to Win
When Wayne Taylor Racing’s GTD pair of Danny Formal and Trent Hindman won at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in 2025, questions abounded on the merit of the win since both drivers and the team acknowledged the No. 45 Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo2 had played a masterful strategic gambit.
There were no such questions Sunday in Monterey, as although strategy played a role in the pair’s success, the weekend pace shown across practice, qualifying and the race were fully evident.
The No. 45 car started second and led 40 of the 111 laps, while finishing on its own lap as the overall winning No. 5 JDC-Miller MotorSports Porsche 963 got between it and the podium finishers.
After a frustrating race in Long Beach where a potential podium went awry from second on the grid there due to mechanical issues, Formal and Hindman got a California win on the board anyway in a second attempt.
“Our fuel gamble was lucky last year; but today everyone was flawless,” Hindman said. “It was no fluke at all. It goes to show as a team and organization you can execute well and finally have the luck and performance.”
For Formal, it was a perfect weekend. The Costa Rican not only won the WeatherTech Championship GTD race but also won both Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America races with WTR in ProAm, co-driving with the team’s IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup third driver Graham Doyle.
“It definitely helped a bit; getting the small experience in Super Trofeo definitely helps,” Formal said. “For sure, the guys did a super job in both the Super Trofeo and GTD cars. It proves how complete Wayne Taylor Racing is. We haven’t been on the podium much, more because we’ve had bad luck.”
With the No. 45 car out front, having emerged from its final pit stop ahead of its rivals, some of the other championship contenders made up the rest of the podium.
The championship-leading Eduardo “Dudu” Barrichello co-drove to second with Tom Gamble, back aboard the No. 27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo, for the car’s third podium in four races.
Frederik Schandorff and Brendan Iribe finished third, in an important result as the top Bronze-classified GTD entry in the No. 70 Inception Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO in the team’s yearlong pursuit of the Bob Akin Award.
Barrichello, whose father, Rubens, was in attendance this weekend, now leads unofficially by 140 points over Turner Motorsport’s Robby Foley and Patrick Gallagher, who finished seventh in the No. 96 BMW M4 GT3 EVO.
GTD PRO races next at its lone street course race of 2026, the Chevrolet Detroit Sports Car Classic, May 29-30, while GTD has an extended break until the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen, June 26-28, at Watkins Glen International.