IMSA: Starworks delays its P2 entry

Starworks Motorsport team owner Peter Baron will look to the second round of the season or sometime after Sebring to debut a new 2017-spec P2 chassis. A two-car PC (pictured above) entry at the Rolex 24 at Daytona for the defending class champions will be Starworks' sole focus for IMSA's WeatherTech SportsCar Championship opener.

Although the Florida-based IMSA team was the first to place a deposit on a 2017 P2 car – a Riley/Multimatic Mk 30 – Baron says the finances required to enter IMSA's Prototype class have proven to be more elusive than expected. Despite the delay, Baron says Starworks' Prototype plans remain unchanged.

"We're making good traction and we'll announce it when it's ready," he told RACER. "But just because we won't be racing a P2 car at Daytona doesn't mean we've given up the ship. I have no problem saying we need to evolve into the P2 class because our [PC] cars will be obsolete at the end of the year. Do we look at a budget for P2 or GTD? That's easy because I'd rather be racing for the overall victory."

Holding off on a P2 program until after Daytona – where all of the new cars from Riley/Multimatic, Dallara, Ligier, and ORECA will be put through 24 hours of torture – might not be a bad thing for Baron. And with the supreme expense involved with buying and running a car for the Rolex 24, he says focusing on a two-car PC effort has its financial merits.

"The budget to ramp up with a new P2 car and deal with the wear and tear afterwards is about $650,000, so having that disappear isn't necessarily a bad thing," Baron said.

The PC class is about to start its farewell tour as IMSA plans to reduce the WeatherTech Championship to three classes while establishing P3 as its replacement in one of its support series. With the pending end to PC, a number of its longstanding teams have stepped out in favor of new Prototype or GTD campaigns, leaving the spec prototype class with something in the region of five or six full-time entries.

"I think we're going to see five cars at Daytona and I still don't understand it," he said. "Fine, the class doesn't exist next year, but it's not a dead class. It's the best class out there for the budget, there's no [Balance of Performance] drama. The car's good, it's updated with great electronics, and I hate to think of the low car counts we could have all year."

Bolstering those car counts could be problematic, according to Baron. The ORECA FLM09-Chevy PC car, which launched the PC class in 2010 for the American Le Mans Series, has found a number of new homes since the most recent season concluded in October.

"A lot of them have gone to vintage racing," he said. "I think there are only six PC cars ready to race in IMSA right now; the rest have gone to private owners for vintage stuff. I'm sure they could be made ready for PC, but they aren't prepared for it right now. What you see racing at Daytona will probably be just about all there is for the year."