March 12, 2025
Valkyrie’s First Ride; Tandy’s Sebring Pursuit; Intense GTD Rolex 24 Encore
By David Phillips
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – It’s (nearly) spring when racing fans’ fancy turn to thoughts of … the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, aka Round Two of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.
At least the 12-hour part has been the case since 1952, when a former six-hour race around the perimeter of an Army Air Corps B-17 training airfield became a 12-hour test of drivers, teams and machines that annually puts the “endurance” in endurance racing. Although the layout and amenities at Sebring International Raceway may have evolved over the past seven decades, the essential nature of the track – rough and tumble concrete airport runways circa WWII coupled with fast and demanding asphalt roadways – remains tougher (and nearly as rough) than a Florida gator’s hide.
What’s to watch for this coming weekend?
Ride of the Valkyrie
The Aston Martin Valkyrie AMR-LMH makes its North American debut at Sebring, joining Acura, BMW, Cadillac, Lamborghini and Porsche in the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) fray. Powered by a normally aspirated 6.5 liter, normally aspirated, Aston Martin-Cosworth RA V-12, the shriek of the Valkyrie will be a sonorous (and welcome) addition to the audio soundtrack of a GTP class that already includes both twin turbo and normally aspirated V8 hybrids as well as twin turbo V6 hybrids.
Although a host of familiar names will be preparing the No. 23 Aston Martin THOR Team Valkyrie, drivers Ross Gunn, Roman De Angelis and Alex Riberas will make their GTP class debuts. In recent seasons Gunn, De Angelis and Riberas-driven Nos. 23 and 27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 and GT3 EVOs have won more than a dozen races in the Grand Touring Daytona (GTD) and GTD PRO classes, with Aston Martin, Heart of Racing Team and De Angelis capturing the GTD PRO manufacturers, team and drivers titles respectively in 2023.
Gunn noted on a pre-event media call that expectations should be kept in check for a debut, but “never say never” about pulling a surprise.
“I think the beauty of endurance racing is there’s so many variables,” he explained. “So many things can happen. We’re very early in our development phase, and again, Sebring is such a difficult circuit on the cars, and on the drivers. I think for us, the key is to just remain realistic.”
“Tandy Slam” Plus His and Penske’s Sebring Pursuit
Porsche and Nick Tandy come to Sebring in pursuit of milestones. Winners of the past two Rolex 24 At Daytona races and defending WeatherTech GTP series manufacturer champions, Porsche is searching for its first overall win in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring since 2008, with a Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) class Porsche RS Spyder. Not surprisingly, Porsche’s last overall triumph at Sebring came in partnership with Penske Racing.
Suffice to say the drivers and crews of today’s No. 6 and No. 7 Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963s would love to match the achievement of their predecessors. Then again, Sebring has a way of springing surprises, so Proton Competition and JDC-Miller Motorsports would like nothing more than to see their No. 5 and No. 85 Porsche 963s be the one to bring the Sebring GTP trophy back to Stuttgart. JDC-Miller most recently pulled a “Sebring surprise” in 2021 with the trio of Tristan Vautier, Sebastien Bourdais and Neel Jani in a privateer Cadillac DPi-V.R.
Meanwhile, one Porsche Penske driver in particular – Tandy – is gunning to become the 10th driver to notch overall wins in the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. He already has wins in the major 24-hour races (Daytona, Le Mans, the Nurburgring and Spa-Francorchamps) as well as three class victories at Sebring to his credit. But an overall win in the No. 7 Porsche 963 he shares with Felipe Nasr and Laurens Vanthoor would be the proverbial icing on the cake. Or is that the icing on the proverbial cake?
GTD and GTD PRO Round Two
Seldom has there been a more appropriate term to characterize the second race in a season as “Round Two” than the coming contests in GTD and GTD PRO. After all, the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona resembled nothing so much as a heavyweight title bout, make that bouts, in both classes.
The No. 65 Ford Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3 and No. 13 AWA Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R may have won GTD PRO and GTD respectively, but only after 24 hours of intense and at times (over) heated clashes among the representatives of the nine automakers in the categories.
“After our Daytona win, we have been on a high,” said Frederic Vervisch, who shares the No. 65 Ford with Christopher Mies and Dennis Olsen. “We learned a lot at the recent test at Sebring, so we are well-prepared for this race. We are feeling very positive and motivated to keep hold of our championship lead. We know it will be hard as it is not the perfect track for our car, but the team is on top form, and we are working well together with our sister car. I’m sure we can achieve a good result.”
Matt Bell, who shares AWA’s No. 13 Corvette with Orey Fidani and Lars Kern added, “It was a dream start to our season. We had a good test at Sebring; we feel well-prepared, but the GTD field is so deep with talent and it’ll be extremely competitive again as we go ahead and take everyone on.”
Chevrolet and Ford may have brought joy to Motown with their Rolex 24 triumphs but defending Sebring GTD PRO and GTD winners Lexus and Mercedes-AMG will be keen to stage repeat performances this weekend, with Aston Martin, BMW, Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche looking to get in on the winning action as well.
Saturday’s 73rd Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring streams live, flag-to-flag, exclusively on Peacock in the U.S. starting at 10:00 a.m. ET and streams internationally on IMSA’s official YouTube channel.
