The 2019 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship schedule has been revealed and will have the same twelve events that are being used in 2018, with only a couple of date changes implemented.
The season will start with the fifty-seventh running of the Rolex 24 at Daytona across the weekend of 24-27 January before the sixty-seventh Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring on 13-16 March. Those two events, along with the Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen on 28-30 June and the season-closing Motul Petit Le Mans on 9-12 October, will form the four races of the Michelin Endurance Cup.
The first of the shorter events will again be the race around the streets of Long Beach on 12-13 April, although the GT Daytona classes will not be present there, but they will be in the race around the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course on 3-5 May, where all four classes will participate.
The round around The Raceway on Belle Isle on 31 May-01 June will be just for the DPi, LMP2 and GTD classes before all four will return for the race at Watkins Glen International, and the 5-7 July journey to the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.
The two GT classes will headline the weekends at Lime Rock Park (19-20 July) and Virginia International Raceway (23-25 August), either side of the weekend at Road America (2-4 August) that will see all four classes racing.
The round at the WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca will take place across the weekend of 13-15 September, before October’s finale at Road Atlanta for Petit Le Mans.
“As we head to the conclusion of the 2018 season, our promoter partners have enjoyed record, or near-record attendance for WeatherTech Championship events, and our 2019 schedule will enable those same promoters to build on that momentum,” said IMSA President Scott Atherton.
“IMSA has been fortunate for the past several years to have a schedule that includes the very best road courses and road racing events in North America, and we are thrilled to confirm our return to these same venues in 2019.
“We have often said that one of the most valuable elements of the merger is the event schedule that resulted – and our 2019 schedule is another reflection of that.”
The GTD races at Mid-Ohio, Detroit, Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Lime Rock, Road America, Virginia and Laguna Seca will also form the newly announced IMSA WeatherTech Sprint Cup season.
The Roar Before the Rolex 24 At Daytona will again will open the year for all of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship teams and drivers on 4-6 January, the only IMSA-sanctioned test of the year.
