BMW and its new American-based WRT team are aiming for an IMSA GTP victory at Road America this weekend. The Belgian squad added an American chapter this season after two years of fielding BMW M Hybrid V8s in the World Endurance Championship. Halfway through its first dual championship campaign, WRT has become the hottest team in sports prototype racing.
Wins in Spa and Sao Paulo secured two WEC victories, and the squad was just 10.9 seconds away from winning at Le Mans. The American WRT team, started from scratch this year, has scored three podiums during its maiden IMSA WeatherTech Championship season. The timing may be ripe at the Motul SportsCar Endurance Grand Prix for WRT to move up to the top step of the podium at the end of Sunday’s six-hour race at Road America.
The four BMW drivers who finished first and second at Road America last year for Team RLL are all returning. The difference is that Dries Vanthoor, who won last year, now pairs with Sheldon van der Linde in the No. 24 entry and winner Philipp Eng is co-driving with Marco Wittmann in the No. 25.
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Changes Under the Hood
The German manufacturer’s decision to send Bobby Rahal and RLL packing in favor of racing in both IMSA and the WEC under one team’s umbrella appears to have accelerated the development of the M Hybrid V8. But perhaps the car itself is just better. Following an unimpressive 2025 campaign by WRT—compared with four straight poles and a victory by the Rahal team—the car underwent a facelift.
BMW’s signature radiator openings at the front end were reduced in size, which improved both aerodynamics and braking as well as the car’s appearance. The new single team arrangement has the benefit of data collection from each of the championships that have the common element of drivers Vanthoor and van der Linde as well as the Michelin Pilot Sport Endurance tires used in both series. Under the guidance of co-owner and team principal Vincent Vosse, the key shared engineers are Adam Hardy, the technical director, and Bernhard Demmer, the over-all program manager.
WRT is actually a motor racing conglomerate that builds cars and races in the major GT3 series worldwide. It’s the kind of operation that can build up a pretty good bench of crew prospects with 24-hour experience, which may explain the success out of the gate.
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Predicting the Outcome
Racing on both sides of the Atlantic has worked for Porsche Penske Motorsports and its Porsche 963s, winners of two straight driving and manufacturing titles in GTP. After cutting back to just the IMSA GTP schedule this year, Porsche’s factory team arrives at Road America with a winless streak of four races. The privateer Porsche of JDC-Miller Motorsports that won at Laguna Seca, meanwhile, no longer receives as much of a break in Balance of Performance for racing its Porsche 963 without this year’s aero updates used by the factory team.
The hottest team in IMSA prototypes is Cadillac’s Action Express Racing, which has won two straight in GTP and has yet to miss the podium. But thanks to BoP, its V-Series.R will be carrying 46 pounds of additional weight on the 4.0-mile Road America course that features long straights and heavy braking zones, not to mention a difficult layout for overtaking.
Because the track’s length often introduces pit and fuel mileage strategies, race outcomes at Road America are all but impossible to forecast. It’s a lot easier to predict a good post-race crowd at the Siebkens bar in nearby Elkhart Lake.
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Vanthoor recognizes that it was a bold strategy by the RLL team that gained enough track position to put the BMWs on top last year. He sees the American WRT effort as still in building mode and is thinking long term.
“We used to have small issues (on the American team) with getting things right on the car, making sure that communication is well within the team and small things like that, which are normal in a new setup,” said Vanthoor. “So, I think we are not far away, but I do think we still have some points on the car to improve. We still have to work hard. Maybe by the end of the year, or for sure next year, we will have a complete package where we can say that we can fight for something nice.”
