IMSA Goes West: TUDOR Championship Kicks Off West Coast Swing

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (April 16, 2015) – After opening the season with a pair of endurance classics in Florida, the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship turns its attention to the West Coast – and more specifically, California – for its next two race weekends.

The TUDOR Championship Prototype (P) and GT Le Mans (GTLM) classes will race on the streets of Long Beach on Saturday, April 18, in the Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase. The 100-minute race will be the featured Saturday event during the 41st running of the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach in the Los Angeles-area harbor community which is the permanent home of the Queen Mary.

The Grand Prix of Long Beach is a crown jewel of motorsports in North America. Long Beach’s racing history dates back to March 26, 1977, when Brian Redman won the inaugural event – a Formula 5000 race – on city streets that would earn worldwide recognition. Long Beach hosted its first Formula 1 race six months later and F1 remained the featured attraction until 1983, when IndyCar racing took over as the Sunday headliner.North American endurance sports car racing series have been a fixture at Long Beach since 2006, when the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series contested a 90-minute race with its Daytona Prototype class. Scott Pruett – who returns this weekend as a defending TUDOR Championship Prototype race champion – won the Rolex Series event for Chip Ganassi Racing alongside then co-driver Luis Diaz.“I love going to Long Beach,” Pruett said. “It’s been a memorable, keystone race in my career, and I have had a lot of success there. Winning the last two races that I’ve been there was pretty exciting.”The American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patrón introduced multi-class, multi-driver sports car racing to the Long Beach fans in 2007 with its inaugural event. ALMS served as the Saturday headliner from 2007 through 2013, before the TUDOR Championship – which brought the ALMS and Rolex Series together – debuted last year. Corvette Racing is the winningest sports car team at Long Beach with five victories from its eight previous appearances. Lucas Luhr, who this weekend will drive the No. 24 IHG Rewards Club BMW Z4 GTLM, is the winningest sports car driver at the Beach with four previous victories.Luhr and Corvette Racing also have enjoyed considerable success a few hundred miles up the Pacific Coast at Monterey’s Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, which hosts the Continental Tire Grand Prix of Monterey powered by Mazda on Sunday, May 3.Luhr will ride a personal Mazda Raceway two-race winning streak into this year’s event, scoring back-to-back ALMS P1 class victories in 2012 and 2013. He did not compete in the event last year. Corvette Racing, meanwhile, has won its class in its last three appearances at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, and owns seven victories in Monterey since 2004.

Mazda Raceway is another facility steeped in tradition The picturesque racetrack was born on November 9, 1957 and has been hosting world-class races and racers ever since. The 11-turn, 2.238-mile layout is one of the most breathtaking and unique in the world. The track’s signature is the famed “Corkscrew” turn – which appears as Turns 8 and 8a on a map – representing the equivalent of a five-and-a-half-story drop in 450 feet of racetrack. The beauty of the racetrack itself, coupled with scenic surrounding areas such as Monterey, Pebble Beach, Santa Cruz and San Francisco, makes the annual TUDOR Championship visit to Monterey a favorite among race fans and many in the industry.The TUDOR Championship round at this year’s Continental Tire Grand Prix of Monterey powered by Mazda will feature all four classes in a two-hour and 40-minute race. Last year, the P and GTLM classes and the Prototype Challenge (PC) and GT Daytona (GTD) classes contested separate, two-hour events.The Sunday afternoon TUDOR Championship race headlines a weekend of IMSA-sanctioned activity that also includes a two-and-a-half-hour Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge race on Saturday, as well as the 2015 debut of the Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America series. The single-make series will introduce the new Lamborghini Hurcán LP 620-2 Super Trofeo racecar in its pair of sprint races on Saturday and Sunday alongside the Lamborghini Gallardo LP 570-4 Super Trofeo cars that have previously raced in the series.It’s time to shine for California racers over the next three weekends. If you can’t be there in person, catch all the action on FOX Sports 1 and IMSA.com. The Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase at Long Beach will be streamed live on IMSA.com this Saturday night at 7 p.m. ET, followed by FOX Sports 1 coverage at 4 p.m. ET on Sunday afternoon. The TUDOR Championship race at the Continental Tire Grand Prix of Monterey powered by Mazda will be televised live on FOX Sports 1 at 4 p.m. ET on Sunday, May 3. The Continental Tire Challenge event from Mazda Raceway will be streamed live on IMSA.com at 4 p.m. ET and will air on FOX Sports 1 at 9 a.m. ET on Sunday, May 17.