The rescheduling of the 24 Hours of Le Mans for August 22-23 has caused other racing series to shift their dates accordingly, and IMSA has now rescheduled the dates of its fifth event at Detroit’s Belle Isle Park.
IMSA announced on Thursday that the Belle Isle race has been shifted back one week and it’s now slated to run the same weekend as IndyCar as it has in years past. The new dates for the Detroit race are June 11-12.
The WeatherTech Championship race weekend at Belle Isle Park was initially set for June 5-6 to avoid a conflict with the 24 Hours of Le Mans that is traditionally is held in June. With that race now moved to August, it opened the door for IMSA to join IndyCar for a double-header weekend of races.
In another change, IMSA is allowing GTLM cars to compete at the Belle Isle race in a non-points capacity so we are expecting Corvette Racing’s C8.Rs to compete on their hometown track. With GM’s Renaissance Center in view of the racing circuit, it will mark the first time since 2008 that the Corvette GTs will race on their home track.
Competing for points at Belle Isle will be the Daytona Prototype International (DPi) and GT Daytona (GTD), though the GTD points will count toward the IMSA WeatherTech Spring Cup and not for the season championship. While it was previously announced that the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) class would be participating at the Motor City event, it will now be competing at a different venue which will be announced at a later date.
“With the 24 Hours of Le Mans moving to August, we were given the opportunity to continue what has become a tradition – giving race fans a weekend full of on-track action with some of the most talented sports car and open-wheel racing drivers in the world,” said John Doonan, IMSA President. “We look forward to returning to Belle Isle Park June 11-12 for the IMSA Chevrolet Sports Car Classic.”
Practice and qualifying for the WeatherTech Championship will take place on Friday, June 11th and the race starts at 5:00 PM ET on Saturday, June 12th. The race will be shown live on NBCSN.
Source:
IMSA
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