Insight: What Was Learned at IMSA's Daytona GTP Test

Reliability likely to play crucial role in outcome of January's season-opening Rolex 24 at Daytona...

This week’s IMSA-sanctioned test at Daytona International Speedway unofficially kicked off the 2023 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season, with all four LMDh manufacturers present for mandatory testing at the site of next month’s highly anticipated Rolex 24.

The excitement and anticipation for the new era for top-level sports car racing was felt throughout the garage area, with new and returning faces sporting brand-new machinery uniting for testing at the ‘World’s Center of Racing.’

While all nine GTP class entries due to take part in the Rolex 24 were present, the test also offered the first glimpse on U.S. soil for the Ferrari 296 GT3, Type-992 Porsche 911 GT3 R and Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, which were also in attendance along with three LMP2 cars for IMSA’s ongoing class stratification evaluations.

New cars, however, present new challenges to competitors and that was the case over the course of the test, which saw nearly every GTP class entry encounter various setbacks, some minor and some slightly more significant.