Runner-up in two races, teams seek to continue strong efforts at Long Beach
DETROIT (April 16, 2024) – After two races totaling 36 hours, the 100-minute IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race in Long Beach, California, will feel like a Saturday stroll on a city beach.
Cadillac Racing will seek its sixth victory in seven races this week on the 1.968-mile, 11-turn temporary street circuit and manufacturer-leading 30th win in IMSA prototype competition since 2017.
A Cadillac DPi won five consecutive races through 2022 (no event in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic), including podium sweeps in ‘22 and ’21, to extend GM’s victory streak to seven in the event. A Chevrolet Corvette DP won the 2015 and ’16 races.
Following runner-up finishes by both the No. 01 Cadillac V-Series.R and No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R, in addition to front-row qualifying lockouts, in the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) races this season, teams and drivers are primed to occupy the top step in Victory Circle.
“It’s a straightforward race with one pit stop and one driver change, but you have to get it right,” said Sebastien Bourdais, who will share time in the seat with Renger van der Zande.
“Hopefully we can keep the strong performance we had in Sebring and particularly in Daytona where we didn’t get the result but were awfully strong.”
Following runner-up finishes by both the No. 01 Cadillac V-Series.R and No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R, in addition to front-row qualifying lockouts, in the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) races this season, teams and drivers are primed to occupy the top step in Victory Circle.
“It’s a straightforward race with one pit stop and one driver change, but you have to get it right,” said Sebastien Bourdais, who will share time in the seat with Renger van der Zande. “Hopefully we can keep the strong performance we had in Sebring and particularly in Daytona where we didn’t get the result but were awfully strong.”
Bourdais and van der Zande won in 2022 and Bourdais – a 2019 Long Beach Walk of Fame inductee – is a four-time winner on the street circuit. They teamed with Scott Dixon to start and finish second March 16 at Sebring International Raceway.
Cadillac has earned three poles and an additional five front row starts at Long Beach since 2017.
The No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R, co-driven by reigning IMSA GTP champion Pipo Derani and Jack Aitken, has earned the pole in both races and started the season with second place in the 24-hour race at Daytona International Speedway. The hybrid Cadillac racecar was running strong in the first half of the 12-hour race at Sebring before an on-track incident forced its retirement.
“As usual, with any street circuit, qualifying is important if you want to have a good chance to win the race because it’s one of the two shortest races we have in the season. You can help yourself a lot by starting up front,” said Derani, who won at Long Beach in 2021.
USA and Peacock will have flag-to-flag action starting at 4:30 p.m. ET, Saturday, April 20. Peacock and IMSA.TV will stream qualifications at 8 p.m. ET, Saturday, April 19. All sessions will be broadcast on IMSA.com and RadioLeMans.com. SiriusXM will also broadcast the race (Sirius 211, XM 206, Web/App 996).
What they’re saying
No. 01 Cadillac V-Series.R
Sebastien Bourdais: “Long Beach is a place that’s been very good to me. I’m always happy to go to Long Beach and be part of that historic event. 2022 was really special, probably one of my top performances although it was created a bit by anger and that little miscue in traffic. I definitely put on a fun race to watch. Last year we struggled to bring the medium tire to temperature, got caught out at the first braking zone and unfortunately having to retire on the spot. That was definitely not a high, but we’ve learned a ton of things over the year now with the GTP. It will be a different tire this year; we’ll be on the soft tire this time so if it gets hot it will be quite a bit of tire management. If it’s overcast and on the cooler side it should be fine. Very different equation tire-wise than last year. Looking forward to the challenge. It’s a straightforward race with one pit stop and one driver change, but you have to get it right. Hopefully we can keep the strong performance we had in Sebring and particularly in Daytona where we didn’t get the result but were awfully strong. Hopefully we can close the gap to the leaders of the championship and get ourselves firmly in the fight.”
Renger van der Zande: “Long Beach is a special one. It has so much of a classic feeling with Formula 1 being there, IndyCar history and great sports car racing. Cadillac has been strong there. If you look at track position, it’s super important. Normally, it’s not easy to overtake on street tracks but Sebastien (Bourdais) has proven that wrong in 2022. He handed me the car in the lead and I was able to win it from there. And we were second the year before. What is very important is the strategy. With cold tires being not easy in this class we need to take that into consideration. I think the team has been on a high level since last year at Petit Le Mans and I think we have a strong package to fight for wins this season. I think you have to take it step by step, focus on the process in each race. I feel very good about it and see what we can do at Long Beach.”
No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R
Pipo Derani: “As usual, with any street circuit, qualifying is important if you want to have a good chance to win the race because it’s one of the two shortest races we have in the season. You can help yourself a lot by starting up front. Hopefully, we can continue our success in qualifying that we’ve had so far this year that will help us in the race. It’s also a race that can flip upside down quickly with yellows, so you need to be on top of your game if you want to maximize your chances. So, hopefully, we can do just that to recover from a difficult race at Sebring and try to do better than we did last year, which was a bit of a risky strategy that did not play out.”
Jack Aitken: “Definitely looking forward to Long Beach. It’s one on the calendar that I picked out at the start of the year as quite a cool challenge. Cadillac being strong there adds to that as well. Being a shorter format race, I’m interested to see if there’s much of a change of the view of traffic and how aggressive people are. With it being a shorter race, it’s about making sure you don’t make any mistakes because time to recover from those is at a premium. I enjoy street circuits, so really looking forward to it.”
