NBC Sports will present more than 80 hours of IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship action in 2023 across NBC, Peacock and USA Network, including live comprehensive coverage of the historic 61st Rolex 24 At Daytona that opens the season Jan. 28-29 at Daytona International Speedway.

NBC Sports’ 2023 WeatherTech Championship schedule is highlighted by 12 hours of NBC broadcast network coverage, matching last year’s total, which was the most since NBC Sports acquired the rights in 2018. Races airing entirely or in part on NBC include the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the Motul Course de Monterey at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca (May 14), the Chevrolet Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park (July 9) and the TireRack.com Battle on the Bricks, which marks the return of the WeatherTech Championship to Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the first time in nine years (Sept. 17).

Peacock will again serve as the streaming home of the WeatherTech Championship with flag-to-flag live coverage of all races as well as exclusive coverage for portions of all four Michelin Endurance Cup races: the Rolex 24, the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts, the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen and the season-ending Motul Petit Le Mans. Peacock will stream Rolex 24 qualifying live on Jan. 22 and will also again exclusively present live coverage of all IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, VP Racing SportsCar Challenge and Lamborghini Super Trofeo races in 2023.

USA Network will present more than 35 hours of live WeatherTech Championship coverage throughout the year. CNBC will air encore presentations of all Michelin Pilot Challenge, VP Racing SportsCar Challenge and Lamborghini Super Trofeo races.

“We’re looking forward to showcasing the exciting, competitive racing in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in 2023 and starting the engines in just a few short weeks with the iconic Rolex 24 At Daytona,” said Matthew Grassie, director, programming and rights management, NBC Sports. “IMSA fans won’t miss a minute of the action throughout the season with the return of comprehensive live race coverage on Peacock and extensive coverage on NBC and USA Network.”

“IMSA is embarking on a new era in 2023 with the introduction of our flagship Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class, featuring the highest-technology and most sustainable race cars competing in North America,” said IMSA President John Doonan. “With NBC network coverage for the launch of this new platform combined with flag-to-flag availability on Peacock and many hours of programming on USA and CNBC, IMSA is poised to experience a substantial boost in interest and popularity beginning next season.”

John Oreovicz

IMSA Wire Service

ZIONSVILLE, Ind. – Bobby Rahal is justifiably proud as he surveys Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing’s brand-new race shop from his upper-level corner office. The expansive facility in the northern Indianapolis suburb houses Rahal’s IndyCar effort along with BMW M Team RLL, the German marque’s works partner, fielding a pair of BMW M Hybrid V8 prototypes in the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class of the 2023 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

The step up to the new-for-2023 top GTP category represents the culmination of Rahal’s 15-year relationship with BMW, during which his organization has orchestrated 29 poles, 21 race wins and nearly 100 podium finishes in IMSA competition.

“We just signed a long-term agreement with BMW last year, and now we actually get to do what I’ve been wanting to do for a number of years and that’s run for overall victories, not just class victories,” Rahal said. “These are sophisticated race cars that are going to be fast, they’re interesting looking, and they’re all a little bit different.

“The races are going to be pretty intense, and fans are going to respond to these cars – they look good and they sound good,” he added. “I think IMSA is about to embark on a very, very exciting time for racing and the sport.”

Though best known for his success in Indy cars, where he won three CART-sanctioned championships and the 1986 Indianapolis 500, Rahal dovetailed the most accomplished phase of his open-wheel driving career with a successful side hustle in sports cars.

In 1987, he finished fifth in the IMSA Camel GT standings despite entering only six of 16 races. He earned podium finishes in every one of those starts, including three wins in Bruce Leven’s Porsche 962.

Rahal counts his 1987 victories in the Twelve Hours of Sebring and a 500-kilometer “sprint” on a Columbus, Ohio, temporary course among his most memorable race wins.

“Winning Sebring in ’87 was very important to me because of my experiences as a teenager when my father raced there, going down there and crewing for him while watching the Porsche 917s and the 512 Ferraris and the Matras and the Ford GT40s,” he recalled. “Those were great days for me.

“Columbus was a 500-kilometer, single-driver street race, and I tell people the only car you could have done that in was a Porsche,” he added. “The 962 was one of my favorite cars, a very comfortable car to drive. You could drive that car hard for a long time.

“I really liked sports car racing and that was a pretty good time in history to drive sports cars.”

But following a big crash at Sebring in a 1985 March prototype, Rahal’s Indy car owner Jim Trueman and team manager Steve Horne increasingly discouraged him from moonlighting in sports cars. Rahal turned down the opportunity to drive for Jaguar in IMSA in 1988, when the XJR-9 prototype broke Porsche’s 11-year win streak in the Rolex 24 At Daytona.

“In ’89, I decided I would just focus on Indy car, and when I look back, I think that was a mistake,” Rahal said. ‘After saying yes to Jaguar, I had to say no. That was a tough call to make.”

Rahal’s return to sports cars would not come until 2008, at the start of the Rahal Letterman Lanigan organization’s association with BMW. By then, he had already been an IndyCar team owner for more than 15 years, but the new BMW partnership was especially timely, because RLL lost a key IndyCar sponsor at the end of 2008 that put the team’s existence in jeopardy.

“We had our first meeting in ’07, and the reason I pursued BMW was we were a one-trick pony in IndyCar,” said Rahal. “I felt it was important that we had more than one program going. When we lost the Ethanol sponsorship in IndyCar, if we didn’t have the BMW program, we would have probably shut down.

“Having both programs is very important, and it’s equally important to have a partner relationship with a company like BMW with a great tradition in motorsports,” he added. “And maybe this is our ticket to go to the 24 Hours of Le Mans, too. We’ll see.”

Like so many others, Rahal is excited about the new GTP class, which is open to prototypes built to IMSA’s LMDh specifications, as well as for the Hypercar class that competes at Le Mans and other FIA World Endurance Championship events.

“I think it’s going to be great; there’s already a lot of interest,” he said. “IMSA is amazing when you think about how many manufacturers are involved, in all the different categories of racing. I don’t think there’s a series out there that can claim the number of manufacturers that IMSA can.

“Jim France has really committed himself to sports car racing over the years and continued to build it, and now with having a car that can race not just here but internationally – and vice-versa with people coming here from Europe to race like they did back in the ‘60s and ‘70s – that’s just fantastic for racing.

“There’s no doubt that there will be ups and downs this year with these new cars and new systems,” Rahal concluded. “But you’ve got Porsche with Penske, Cadillac with Ganassi (and Action Express), BMW with us, and Honda/Acura with Wayne Taylor and Mike Shank. Lamborghini is coming in 2024. You’ve got Dallara vs. ORECA vs. Multimatic (vs. Ligier in 2024). These are the works efforts, the factory teams. Having that connection and relationship between the series and the manufacturers is going to be fantastic for IMSA in terms of promotion and marketing.”

David Phillips

IMSA Wire Service

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Good things come to those who wait. At least John Church and his colleagues at JDC-Miller MotorSports hope so.

For while the likes of the factory teams for Acura, BMW, Cadillac and Porsche – the manufacturers competing in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s new top prototype class, Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) – are pounding around racetracks preparing for a new era of IMSA competition, JDC-Miller MotorSports is playing a waiting game.

As Porsche’s first and – to date – sole confirmed GTP customer, Church & Company have long known they will not have their new car in time for the 2023 season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona. And while they hope to debut their Porsche 963 in March at the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts – a race JDC-Miller won in 2021 – that is looking unlikely. Earlier this month, Urs Kuratle, Porsche Motorsport’s LMDh director, pegged late April as the more likely delivery date.

Still, it’s not as if the Savage, Minnesota-based squad is sitting idly this “offseason.” The team’s engineers and mechanics have attended three tests of the new Porsche 963, including a 36-hour endurance run at Sebring in October. Nor is it as if the JDC-Miller squad was sitting in the cheap seats taking notes. Rather, as much as possible for tests where the hands-on personnel wear Penske or Porsche garb, Church’s representatives were integrated in the proceedings.

“It’s been very positive,” says Church, the organization’s CEO and managing partner. “Our engineering group and mechanics have gotten to see everything that’s been going on, ask any questions we might have and get straightforward answers. Everything has been open book.”

Of course, at this nascent stage of the GTP game, there really aren’t many secrets between two teams destined to battle one another during the 2023 WeatherTech Championship campaign, even though both will be carrying the Porsche standard.

“It’s all big-picture stuff,” Church says, “familiarizing ourselves with the car and the systems, understanding why things work the way they do. It’s all about getting miles rather than going fast at this point. The 36-hour test was very encouraging; relatively flawless. The car just kept running and pounding out the laps.

“It is a little frustrating having to wait, but we’re making the most of it and Porsche and Penske have been very supportive. We don’t have a firm delivery date for a car. We definitely won’t have the car for the Rolex 24 Hours. It’s possible we’ll be at Sebring, but at this point we’re not planning on it. All I can say for sure is that we’ll run it just as soon as we get it.”

Lest you get the wrong impression, JDC-Miller MotorSports will be very much in action in the opening rounds of the 2023 IMSA campaign at Daytona and Sebring, regardless of when delivery of the Porsche 963 takes place. The team plans to compete in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge with a new Audi RS3 LMS TCR, renewing the relationship with Unitronic and drivers Chris Miller and Mikey Taylor, winners at Lime Rock last year as well as at Daytona and VIRginia International Raceway en route to sixth place in the 2021 Touring Car (TCR) standings. 

“Michelin Pilot is a fun series,” says Church. “We’ve enjoyed our relationship with Unitronic and our success with Chris and Mike. Last year’s win at Lime Rock was especially rewarding given that, at the time, that generation of the Audi was the oldest homologated car in the series. So we’re really excited about the new car.”  

And while the driver lineup has yet to be announced – much like the GTP program – JDC-Miller plans to run a Le Mans Prototype 3 (LMP3) Duqueine at Daytona, Sebring and the full WeatherTech Championship LMP3 schedule – and perhaps the new VP Racing SportsCar Challenge. Memo Gidley and Alexander Koreiba finished second this season in the IMSA Prototype Challenge, the predecessor to the VP Racing Challenge.

“We got a win and three podiums with Memo and Alex last year and would like to keep them involved along with a new driver or two. But that depends on the budget scenario. It’s all one big puzzle – Michelin Pilot, LMP3, GTP – and each program represents one piece.”

Regardless of the particular pieces of the other programs, JDC-Miller MotorSports will be a keen observer of the GTP debut at the Rolex 24.

“Even though we won’t have a car, we’ll be there,” says Church. “Keeping a close eye on the GTP class, understanding what’s happening and why, and putting it all to good use with our own program when the time comes.”