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Detroit rules IMSA finale: Caddy wins, Penske and Corvette score titles, Mustang expands
Posted by Talbot Payne on October 15, 2025
Brandon Badraoui, Lumen Digital Agency
Braselton, Georgia — Detroit brands dominated the season finale of the 2025 IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship season at Petit Le Mans as Motown went toe-to-toe against the world’s best.
Cadillac took first place overall after a command performance over the grueling 10-hour race around the 2.5-mile Road Atlanta race course north of Atlanta. But it was the Porsche Penske team — managed by Bloomfield Hills-based Team Penske — that won the season title, its second in a row. In the production-based GTD Pro class, Chevrolet put an exclamation point on a successful season with New Hudson-based Pratt Miller taking home the championship in its signature yellow Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs.
The celebrations marked a three-year surge in which Detroit brands have stepped up their presence in international motorsports to compete against the world’s top performance badges. The International Motor Sports Association — and its companion World Endurance Championship (which includes the 24 Hours of Le Mans in France) — are the world’s premier sportscar racing series. Both Corvette (four entries in IMSA, two in WEC) and Ford Mustang (three entries in IMSA, two in WEC) — have shown early promise as they compete against the likes of Porsche, Ferrari, Aston Martin, Mercedes and Lamborghini in the racing market with world-class GT3 cars.
“The competition is strong, the track’s amazing, the number of fans that are here is incredible and every year they attract more,” said Jim Campbell, General Motors Co. vice president for performance and motorsports, in a trackside interview. “It’s indicative that this is the heyday of sportscar racing in North American . . . and globally.”
IMSA reported a sold-out event with an estimated 100,000-plus fans descending on the 28th annual Petit Le Mans, which mirrors Europe’s top sportscar event, the Le Mans 24 Hours. In all, 18 brands competed with 53 cars on grid piloted by 159 of the world’s top drivers.
The infield was littered with performance automaker activations — once seen at car shows — showcasing the latest models.
“IMSA was started as a place for the automakers to come showcase their product, their powertrains, their vehicle platforms from all over the world,” IMSA President John Doonan said in an interview. “And as a born-and-raised Midwestern boy from Chicago, to have the domestic brands firmly back in our sport is really heartwarming.”
Michael L. Levitt, Lumen Digital Agency
After qualifying on the front row next to the Acura ARX-06 GTP — an echo of the Caddy team’s historic front-row sweep at Le Mans in June — the #31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R GTP fought for the lead throughout. Ultimately, it came down to a three-horse race along with the title-winning #6 Porsche Penske 963 GTP and screaming, V12-powered fan-favorite Aston Martin Valkyrie GTP — with just 12 seconds separating the trio after 10 hours.
The #6 car’s championship marked the 48th racing title for Team Penske Chairman Roger Penske.
“Building a global program to compete and win across two different racing series with our teams headquartered in both the U.S. and Germany is a massive undertaking,” said Penske, 88, in an interview. “To be able to design, build and test a new car in the Porsche 963 and to win consistently and earn championships in both IMSA and WEC is incredible.”
Henry Payne, The Detroit News
The team’s championship helped salve the disappointment of Porsche’s announcement earlier in the week that it is exiting the 2026 WEC championship, denying — for now — another shot for Penske to win Le Mans, one of the few major trophies that has eluded him.
“They’ll be back,” said veteran motorsports writer and Hagerty Special Projects Editor Steven Cole Smith. “They made a bad bet on the EV market, and now they’re backtracking like everybody else.”
Penske himself was optimistic. “Looking ahead, we’ll be back racing in IMSA next season and look forward to competing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans again in the future with an opportunity to earn our team’s first win in that legendary race,” he said.
Penske is widely respected in the IMSA paddock, and other teams lamented Porsche’s news. But the German company’s decision was viewed not as a trend but as a singular event.
Henry Payne, The Detroit News
“We’ve seen times when there’s outside pressures (on) programs that have had to change direction,” Doonan said. IMSA/WEC sportscar racing “is really the most authentic way to market your brand. I’m positive of the momentum, and we’re just going to continue to take really good care of it and control costs to the best of our abilities.”
Genesis will join the IMSA GTP field in 2027 and both Ford and McLaren are likely for 2028 after their Le Mans debuts in 2027.
“The Porsche Peske effort is one we pay close attention to, but in sportscar racing you have brands that go into a series for a period of time and then they go out,” said GM’s Campbell. “The auto industry is hyper-competitive. Our focus is running these programs in an efficient way, making sure our investment is returning benefit to the brand.”
Campbell said Cadillac is full speed ahead in 2026 on its IMSA, WEC and Formula One programs: “We see (motorsports) as lifting the Cadillac brand, and we’re winning. When you do that, shoppers put you on their shopping list more quickly.”
Brandon Badraoui, Lumen Digital Agency
A big part of international sportscar racing’s success has been the homogenization of rules across series like IMSA and WEC. Today, manufacturers make a race car to the same spec to race at Le Mans as Petit Le Mans.
That also means navigating international politics — particularly in Europe, where automakers are wrestling with climate regulations forcing the end of internal combustion engines, a key factor in Porsche’s financial woes. To that end, IMSA and WEC see synthetic/renewable fuels as a solution to maintain the visceral thrill of racing with V-6, V-8 and V-12 engines.
“We’ve launched an 80% renewable fuel, and are pushing hard to get to the 100% manufacturers want,” Doonan said. “That’s the development space future for us and for the automakers.”
If the top GTP class shows off brands’ technical chops, then the production-based GT class is where money is made.
Jake Galstad, Lumen Digital Agency
GM has made a major investment transitioning from an in-house factory team to manufacturing Corvette GT3 racers marketed to customer teams. This year’s GT3 win — in just Corvette’s second year as a customer program — was especially gratifying.
“That was a big decision to go from full works team to the GT3 with a customer team focus. It’s really worked well, especially in the second year,” Campbell said. “Around the world, the Corvette Z06 GT3.R has been doing really well. We’re proud of that.”
Corvette held off Ford and Ferrari — both of which had an outside shot at the GTD title going into Petit Le Mans. Ford settled for fourth and fifth place, but Ford Racing President Mark Rushbrook was thrilled with a Mustang sophomore season that included three wins.
Brandon Badraoui, Lumen Digital Agency
“There are nine different manufacturers in the GTD Pro class, which gives us the opportunity to take a production-based Mustang and compete against the very best in the world,” he said in an interview. “We’ve developed a great car with our partners at Multimatic to be able to . . . show what the Mustang is capable of.”
Next year, two customer teams (Gradient and Riley) will enter Mustangs alongside the Ford factory IMSA effort. Ford is also setting its sights on winning the top prototype class with a return to the pinnacle of sportscar racing for the first time since its historic Le Mans four-peat in 1966-1969.
“We’ll be going back to Le Mans at the very top in Hypercar for the overall win of Le Mans against Ferrari — against all the best manufacturers,” Rushbrook said of the teams’ planned 2027 debut. “We can’t wait to get there.”
Henry Payne is auto critic for The Detroit News. Find him at hpayne@detroitnews.com or @HenryEPayne.