Class warfare: How IMSA's GTD and LMP2 champions rose to the top

Winward Racing (GTD) and CrowdStrike Racing by APR (LMP2) capped off their championship-winning 2026 seasons with wins on Saturday at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta.

It was a historic third consecutive set of GTD championships for the No. 57 Winward Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO (main image), led by drivers Russell Ward, Philip Ellis – and Indy Dontje, who helped the team win the 2026 GTD Michelin Endurance Cup. No combination of team and drivers had ever won three straight GTD championships since the current era of IMSA began in 2014.

“To top off such a tough and up-and-down season like we had this year with a win here at Petit Le Mans was just amazing,” said Ellis, Winward Racing’s designated Mercedes-AMG factory driver. “I’m glad we could get that result for the team. I think everybody, all the boys and girls on the team, deserve that result. To celebrate the championship with a win on the last race is something special.”

And to think that less than four months ago, it didn’t seem likely that a three-peat was in consideration.

Winward Racing started the year with a thrilling win at the Rolex 24 At Daytona, the team’s third Daytona class win in six years. But the following race at Sebring, the No. 57 Mercedes-AMG was wiped out in a crash. A penalty during the street race in Long Beach removed the possibility of an immediate bounce back. Then, at Watkins Glen, the No. 57 Mercedes took major damage in a multi-car accident in the Esses. Winward left the Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen trailing by 300 points in the GTD standings.

Ward and Ellis then went on to win four of the final five races: Three in a row at CTMP, Watkins Glen, and VIR, and then the team’s first win at Motul Petit Le Mans to close out the year, in an event where Winward had never finished higher than fifth in class prior to this season.

“Us three drivers were pretty sorry in the paddock, looking at the car, watching the mechanics just jump all over it," team owner/driver/namesake Ward recalled. "From our standpoint we thought the race was done, let's pack this thing up, move on to the next. Those guys were like: Hell no. We need to get out there and capitalize on points.

“They really set the tone for the second half of the season. We can't quit, (we have to) keep pushing as hard as we can. We went on a five-race streak with podiums, four wins and a second in Indianapolis, which very well could have been a win as well, and it could have been five wins in a row. That really just set us up.”

Any sort of championship tension was eliminated very early on when rivals Turner Motorsport and Heart of Racing Team succumbed to mechanical issues before the end of the first hour. But give Winward its due: Needing only to coast to the end of the 10 hours, Ward, Ellis, and Dontje went for the victory and got it, claiming the Endurance Cup in doing so and completing a full set of IMSA GTD titles for drivers, team, and manufacturer.

“It means as much to the Ward family as it does to every single member of this team,” Ward said. “We really got an amazing core group of people that give us the machinery and the ability to come out and perform and put on a good show.

Crowdstrike by APR had to deliver when it mattered to seal the LMP2 crown. Jake Galstad/Getty Images

“For us it's an incredible accolade. If you asked me when we started in IMSA racing back in 2017 that we'd be here less than 10 years later, I wouldn't believe you. You really have to have the never-quit mentality. That's how you get it done.”

And after winning the IMSA championship, the 24-hour races at Daytona and the Nürburgring, the GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup, and still with a chance to win the DTM championship, some wonder, what’s left for Winward Racing to achieve?

“I guess the four-peat,” Ward smiled. “GTD Pro would be something pretty exciting to do, as well. I don't know what can happen. I'd love to be involved in that group, but we're a privateer team. I'm not sure we could afford the crash damage you would accumulate by going to GTD Pro! It’s a lot of bodywork, and I don't know that AMG has that available! If Mercedes-AMG decided to back us, I think we'd do it.”

In contrast to the tap-in goal for Winward, CrowdStrike Racing by APR’s victory in LMP2 proved to be the decisive victory for George Kurtz, Alex Quinn, and Toby Sowery in their championship bid.

Like Winward Racing, Algarve Pro Racing started the year with a win at the Rolex 24 At Daytona, one which had narrowly escaped the team a few times in years past. Like Winward Racing, the CrowdStrike-sponsored team also had success outside of IMSA, winning the Asian Le Mans Series championship between Daytona and Sebring, and winning the LMP2 Pro/Am class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans itself.

Just two hours before the finish however, the team’s hopes of winning Petit Le Mans and the LMP2 championship were seemingly extinguished after the championship-leading No. 43 Inter Europol Competition ORECA clobbered the No. 04 CrowdStrike by APR car and damaged the rear. 

Quinn was able to stay on the lead lap after rapid repairs to his car, and a critical fuel-only stop for the No. 04 put it back in position to win the race. The drama wasn’t over though, as Inter Europol’s Tom Dillmann fought back from the drive-through penalty he received and closed to within a second of Quinn on the last lap, in pursuit of both the win and the championship.

But the No. 04 held on by 0.666s to win Petit Le Mans, the full-season LMP2 championship, the Michelin Endurance Cup – and the Jim Trueman Award for Kurtz, which comes with an invite to next year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans.

“This is incredibly special because it was really a team effort,” said CrowdStrike’s Kurtz. “My co-drivers were phenomenal. The team gave us a great car. There was so much adversity we had to overcome for the entire season – but obviously this race, it was up and down. It really was a shootout with the 43.

“From my perspective, this is probably one of the best seasons I've ever had. With all the wins up and down the board, to crown it with the championship – we’ve come so close. In '23 we lost by a point in the championship. We were close at Daytona in '23. This year we won Daytona, won this. For me, it's a year of redemption.”

“I said to a few people, we're so happy – relieved, in some ways, to win the championship,” said Quinn, who is part of Peugeot Sport’s driver development program in the FIA World Endurance Championship. “I forgot we won the race, but when you realize you do it, it does make it extra special. Such a unique intense race, especially this one, the way it all panned out. 

“An amazing day, it rounds off an amazing year.”