Imsa 2023

[rfuerst911sc]

Final thoughts: Congrats to Ferrari they definitely earned the win . I would not count out Toyota . Fantastic results for CGR Cadillac they really battled for 24 hours . Porsche Penske have to solve their reliability issues , to have both Glickenhouse entrees finish in front of PP is not good no offense to Glick . I think team Jota showed a lot of promise especially seeing they only got their car about 8 weeks ago .

LMP2 again was a very close fight and very exciting to watch . GT AM also was a good show , Corvette going out on top as a full factory effort . Iron Dames just finished off the podium in 4th .

I really enjoyed watching , the announcers at times were difficult to understand but overall did a good job . I think I heard them say that 3 hours were spent under yellow , could have done without that . Aprox 1/3rd of the field didn't finish that is high attrition . On to the next race

[Captain Ahab Jr]

Wow, Porsche we're nowhere 16th place and 17 laps down on the winning Ferrari

Congratulations to Ferrari, they'll be celebrating back in Maranello

Cadillac should be pleased too

Garage 56, we'll at least they tried

[URY914]

Big surprise but the sport needed a new winner.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by Captain Ahab Jr

Wow, Porsche we're nowhere 16th place and 17 laps down on the winning Ferrari

Congratulations to Ferrari, they'll be celebrating back in Maranello

Cadillac should be pleased too

Garage 56, we'll at least they tried

Yea, Porsche's big return to the top level at Le Mans was an embarrassment. Five other manufacturers whipped them like a rented mule.

Oh well, maybe next year?

The coverage on Motortrend TV was pretty good overall. To cover the entire race was wonderful. I am really happy I have a DVR that recorded it for me. I could fast forward through the long long almost endless cautions. And the multiple commercials.

Porsche needs to have a long look at reliability. They built their reputation around reliability. They had a 10 year old 1960s British car, in the rain level of reliability.

[javadog]

I thought the coverage was awful. Seems that nobody could afford to buy even one pit reporter to ask questions, so we never had a clue as to what was happening to the cars when they came into the pits. Eurosport had a small covey of fluffers who asked completely irrelevant questions of the occasional driver, one actually wandered the grounds near the pits see if she could be spotted in the crowd. Riveting stuff.

Eurosport had a really bad habit of inserting pre-recorded crap at times when there was action on the track, as opposed to when we were going to sleep with an hour-long safety car parade.

Speaking of the safety car, whoever came up with that new procedure ought to be shot. Twice. A guaranteed one hour parade, every time the son of a ***** came out. The first four hours, I think they had something like a whopping 60 laps can of actual green flag running.

The decision by the tire companies to not have intermediate tires available was another godawful decision. I wonder how many millions of dollars got tossed in the dumpster as a result of all those crashes?

Listening to the commentary on RadioLeMans wasn’t much better. None of the commentary was sufficiently focused on the action appearing on the screen, they got into one tangent after another, and it made the old US productions on channels like Speed look a lot better than I ever thought they would.

That said, the racing in all the classes was pretty evenly matched. Good on them for that.

It was a sobering thought to think that, Ferrari’s absence from Le Mans was so long that they literally have missed half of the hundred years that the race has been held. Wow. Good on them for the win. I wonder if they permited the church bells to have been rung in Maranello today, even though it wasn’t an F1 victory…

[CurtEgerer]

I agree the coverage leaves LOTS to be desired but I'm appreciative that at least the entire race is televised. I prefer the RadioLeMans guys but they're not great either. They've got the guy who reads the entire scoring list for each class once an hour or so - usually while there's some critical action going on. Granted, it's not easy to cover a 24-hour race with multiple classes and a large part of it in the dark, compared to F1 or Indy, but still .... maybe the increased fan interest will warrant some investment in better coverage next year.

GH: my feed on Motortrend TV + had no commercials. Is it the + that makes a difference? They also had on-board feeds of 15-20 cars available but I didn't use any of that. Motortrend, in general, is a horrible app. I can only access it on my laptop and 1 of 3 TVs in the house. The others are "non-compatible devices" for some mysterious reason They need to move coverage to Peacock or a major network.

[CurtEgerer]

The Ferrari win, whether you're a fan or not, was fantastic for the sport - endurance racing is on a roll. A pic of the winning car, earlier this year in Sebring:

[GH85Carrera]

Yep, it is great the Ferrari is back, and threw down the gauntlet for Porsche and the others to follow or take over the lead. Toyota had some actual competition for the first time in many years, and they are fast and finished the race. More than I can say for the mighty Porsche race teams. Cadillac is just a rebranded Corvette, none the less a GM based checkbook car. They were fast and reliable, just not quite fast enough.

Tiny little Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus, based in Sleepy Hollow New York had some bad luck, and still beat the Porsches.

Peugeot was disappointed in their finish, but they finished in a respectable place.

[matthewb0051]

WEC next round is Monza. After this result for Ferrari it will be crazy town in Monza.

Not sure if it was based on facts, but the announcers were speculating that ticket sales have increased 5 fold as Le Mans got close to the checkered flag. I wouldn't be surprised.

[matthewb0051]

Originally Posted by CurtEgerer

John Doonan sucking up to his NASCAR overlords for 15 minutes "It's a Cup engine with a little topend work". Umm, it's 750HP with a 1/4 ton of weight removed. And it's getting trounced by the 500HP GTE cars. Enough already. How about discussing the cars that are actually racing for position.

I'm still trying to figure out how they got that car to turn right.

[CurtEgerer]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

Peugeot was disappointed in their finish, but they finished in a respectable place.

Surprise of the race for sure. From backmarkers to genuinely leading the race for an hour or 2. Great to see. But is the radical design intended specifically for Le Mans and this is the best they've got, or can they be semi-competitive the rest of the season?

[CurtEgerer]

Porsche is saying they will have up to 8 963 customer cars - 4 in IMSA and 4 in WEC + the 4 factory cars. So Le Mans 2024 could see 8-10 963s - the 6 WEC cars and 2-3 IMSA cars. Porsche being Porsche (and with so many cars to test) it is unlikely to suffer a repeat of the reliability problems they had this year.

[Scott Douglas]

I enjoyed watching the race with the sound turned down.
As an old guy I could only imagine what it was like back in the early '60's to race there.
Now I get to see it from inside the cars.

[Deschodt]

Late to the party as I was busy driving down from Le mans to the sout.. Managed to duck a lot of rain..

[Deschodt]

[CurtEgerer]

^^^ Awesome, thanks!

[CurtEgerer]

I'm going to call it for BMW in the 6-Hour race at Watkins Glen. They've been slowly improving in each race and have had impressive practice times all weekend. I think they're calling for intermittent rain, so it could be a complete crapshoot.

[astrochex]

Originally Posted by CurtEgerer

I'm going to call it for BMW in the 6-Hour race at Watkins Glen. They've been slowly improving in each race and have had impressive practice times all weekend. I think they're calling for intermittent rain, so it could be a complete crapshoot.

You were off by one lap, Curt.

Great final stint for the #6. Post race interview of Jaminet is a gem.

[CurtEgerer]

^^^ even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while. Porsche found to have skid plate infraction and loses the win! BMW victorious - 1st prototype win in 23 years (V12 LMR).

[CurtEgerer]

It was great to see both Penske Porsches lapping in formation at the head of the field for a couple of hours - the way it should be, all is right with the world And then it wasn't.

The Penske DQ may bump Cadillac up into 1st in the manufacturer championship?