DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — By way of the primary quarter of the brand new century in an ever-evolving home sports activities automotive panorama, one IMSA class has stayed comparatively constant: the Michelin Pilot Problem Grand Sport class.
A hotbed for pony vehicles, home-built specials and, most not too long ago as of 2017 to current day, SRO GT4 homologated thoroughbreds, GS typically gives a few of IMSA’s finest racing on any given weekend.
The March 14 Alan Jay Automotive Community 120 at Sebring Int’l Raceway marks the 250th race since for the category because it got here underneath Grand-Am sanction in 2001. That whole covers 249 earlier GS and GSI class races by the 2025 Michelin Pilot Problem season-opening BMW M Endurance Problem at Daytona Int’l Speedway.
Reflecting on the highway to 250 GS races, a few of Michelin Pilot Problem’s most frequent GS winners weighed in on the category and what it’s meant to the North American sports activities automotive panorama.
“I’ve at all times felt for many of my profession, GS tends to be higher than GT when it comes to battles the sector has for shut racing,” mentioned Billy Johnson, the 2016 GS champion and co-leader in all-time Michelin Pilot Problem wins with 24 whole, 20 in GS.
“It’s the proper instance of human evolution,” added Matt Plumb, a two-time GS champion (2013, 2024) and the person tied with Johnson on 24 Michelin Pilot Problem wins, though he’s obtained 21 in GS. “Every part has progressed to be so specialised and technical. It’s mild years forward of the place it was even 10 years in the past in 2015.”
“The GS format has at all times had a minimal drive time, and a pit cease. That consistency ranges the taking part in discipline between professional/am and professional/professional groups,” famous Will Turner, whose Turner Motorsport staff is the all-time winningest GS staff with 29 victories.
“As a GT4 class, there isn’t one other one globally the best way GS operates in IMSA. Correct pit stops. Correct technique. It’s a correct race. It’s old style,” mirrored Robin Liddell, a 17-time GS winner and 2015 GS champion.
This quartet of longtime GS stalwarts encapsulate simply among the evolution that’s occurred within the class over 25 years and the primary 249 races. The constant theme that’s emerged is the GS of at present has shifted from a build-your-own battler to a buy-from-manufacturer mannequin. What hasn’t modified is the competitiveness, depth and door-to-door motion.
“Once we first began in ‘05, we constructed new vehicles for Grand-Am,” mentioned Turner, who like many GS opponents began in World Problem. “I nonetheless bear in mind within the store constructing every little thing from the cages, to the place we’d put the gasoline cells, even arising with splitter designs on the entrance. Then we’d have to run to the Turner components facet of issues to seek out components for the race automotive! It was that straightforward, for us, having the components retailer associated to the race staff.”
KohR Motorsports staff principal/driver Dean Martin, an engineer by background, added, “Your job right here is to determine what somebody is doing higher after which evolve your individual consideration to element to beat them. I say loads that extra races are received again within the store than on the monitor. In case you don’t prep proper, you’re going to battle.”
Many memorable races stand out. For the Plumb brothers, Matt and older brother Hugh, it meant displaying up in Daytona with solely their helmets and no rides in 2002.
“I primarily thought to myself, ‘I’m both going to give up racing or make this occur,’” Matt Plumb mentioned. “I began performing some teaching and I wandered right down to Daytona simply to take a look at the sports activities automotive factor and that finally led to a pivot into closed prime racing.”
Hugh Plumb added, “Exhibiting up two days earlier than the race, hoping to get a journey, these have been the times the place that might occur. It sounds hysterical now, however the fascination of getting a journey at Daytona appeared like this actually cool factor.”
For Johnson, it included successful historic races for the Roush household as a part of a dynamic run of type from 2009 to 2013, when he received 10 GS races in a five-year span.
“At Miller Motorsports Park in ’09, I used to be battling Invoice Auberlen the final 10 laps, altering the lead two-three occasions a lap,” Johnson recalled. “I got here out on prime there and that gave Jack Roush Jr. his first skilled race win.
“Then at Homestead-Miami Speedway in ’10, we received once more, and that was Jack’s father’s four-hundredth victory as a staff proprietor throughout NASCAR, drag racing and sports activities automotive racing. They’d made problem cash with 400 on the again. Different groups tried to realize that win for Jack Roush Sr., however we obtained it executed. Jack got here again by the sector after a tech subject and we received the race anyway. These have been good recollections.”
For Turner, it was his first win in a GS-only race almost 20 years in the past in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic with Invoice Auberlen and Justin Marks.
“Our staff was in its infancy; we weren’t all skilled race crew. It felt getting in like a enjoyable trip in addition to a race,” Turner laughed. “Past the win, I bear in mind two issues. One, what number of followers we had within the Dominican Republic. It was so fan-heavy that when Justin and Invoice received, they needed to do a ‘human chain’ round them to get them from the automotive to the rostrum!
“The second was how good the race was. It was a low-grip, makeshift monitor and very popular, dry and dusty, but it surely was so good for the followers to see it from in all places. To win our first one there was nuts. Justin was a child again then, and even Invoice had hair!”
Liddell’s final laps fourth-to-first cost within the rain at Street America 2019, passing two vehicles in Canada Nook after which chief Kuno Wittmer simply earlier than the beginning/end line, stands as a GS all-timer.
“As I got here onto the frontstraight I used to be fairly glad about ending second however the subsequent factor I noticed was the chief slowing and pulling over in entrance of me. I simply stored my foot in it, drove onto the grass and squeezed previous simply earlier than the road,” Liddell mirrored.
The battle between Plumb and Johnson has carried by three a long time of GS, even when each drivers haven’t at all times overlapped within the sequence. What’s clear is that each have an enormous quantity of respect for one another, and a need to beat the opposite one.
“It’s been superior all through our careers,” Johnson mentioned. “Our rivalry has gone again so a few years, at the same time as I used to be out of the sequence for a number of years. That one interval from ’09 to ’12, it felt like if I didn’t win, Matt received, or vice versa. That speaks to the depth of the sector. I feel a standard denominator is us successful all through completely different generations of vehicles and codecs of racing.”
Plumb added, “I feel I mentioned it to him at Daytona, however I’m glad that he’s the one who I’m competing towards for this win (document). As a result of I do respect the hell out of him. Realizing he’s in entrance or behind me, he’s obtained simply sufficient sense to race him the place it really works out for each of us. Regardless of if you’re round him, he races you an identical. I’m glad to share that document with him, however I’ll nonetheless do something to kick his rear finish.”
Profitable is difficult in GS. Turner, BMW’s longest serving buyer staff, has made greater than 600 begins and estimated it’s made greater than 370 of these in GS, working a minimum of two vehicles most years.
Behind Turner’s 29 wins, amongst energetic GS groups, KohR is the second-winningest staff with 9 GS wins, with its predecessor Rehagen Racing including 5 extra wins. Insurgent Rock Racing has eight, BGB Motorsports six, RS1 and Group TGM 5 apiece, CarBahn 4 and Winward Racing three.
Jeff Lapcevich and John Shreiner received the primary GS race on February 4, 2001 in a Ford Mustang Cobra R at Daytona. Almost 24 years later, Michael Cooper and Moisey Uretsky received the 249th GS race in Daytona of their No. 44 Accelerating Efficiency McLaren Artura GT4, to turn out to be the 149th and a hundred and fiftieth drivers to win a GS race.
