Wayne Taylor has revealed that the chance to take his team to the Le Mans 24 Hours played a major role in his switch back to Cadillac for the IMSA SportsCar Championship.
He described the prospect of Wayne Taylor Racing entering the centrepiece round of the World Endurance Championship for the first time as “one of the factors” behind the move from Acura to Cadillac announced last week.
“The chance to go to Le Mans was a big part of making the change, because Acura has indicated that it has no plans to go and that race is central to Cadillac’s programme,” Taylor told Motorsport.com.
“For Cadillac, this is really a global programme: WEC and Le Mans are the number one priorities. But America is important because it is where they sell the majority of cars, which is why we will be running two cars in IMSA.”
Taylor has never made any secret of his ambition to take the team he established for the 2007 season to Le Mans to try to add to its wins in the marquee enduros in North America - the Daytona 24 Hours, Sebring 12 Hours and Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.
The switch back to Cadillac, with which WTR won the Daytona IMSA blue riband three times in four years from 2017-20, gives the team the opportunity to race at Le Mans because the General Motors brand also contests the WEC with its V-Series.R LMDh.
WEC rules allow for additional entries for the 24 Hours from a manufacturer contesting the series in the Hypercar class: in the past two years Chip Ganassi Racing has fielded an extra Caddy alongside its full-season world championship entry and Action Express Racing has also joined the grid with one car.
Taylor explained that he was hopeful that WTR would be at the race he contested 13 times as a driver next year.
“I am the eternal optimist, so I am expecting to be there until someone tells me otherwise,” said Taylor. “Jota will have two cars in WEC [when it takes over the factory programme from Ganassi] and we are hopeful that Caddy can have two more for Le Mans.”
Should that happen, it is likely that WTR would land one and Action Express the other, Taylor suggested.
WTR having been partnered with Andretti Global since last year, Taylor described the return to Cadillac “as a homecoming”.
He has links with Cadillac parent company GM dating back to 1991 when as a driver he was a race winner with Chevrolet’s Intrepid GTP IMSA programme in IMSA and subsequently did the double at Daytona and Sebring in 1996 with an Oldsmobile-powered Riley & Scott MkIII World Sports Car, before going on to be one of the partners in the British-based 3GR organisation that masterminded Cadillac’s Northstar LMP programme at Le Mans and in the American Le Mans Series in 2001-02.
“If you think about it, I drove for so many of GM’s brands: Chevrolet, Oldsmobile Aurora, Pontiac and Cadillac,” said Taylor.
“It has been a very long relationship and the way they have accepted me back in is amazing, I really feel that they have got their arms around me.”
Taylor revealed that he was also excited to again be working with Dallara, which is Cadillac’s development partner for the LMDh.
He linked up with the Italian constructor in the Grand-Am Daytona Prototype and the IMSA Daytona Prototype international eras and before that raced the Ferrari 333SP WSC car co-developed by Dallara for the Momo/Doran and Risi Competizione teams in IMSA in 1995 and ’98-’99 respectively.
“This has brought us back with Dallara, which I see as really significant,” said Taylor. “They built us a DP back in 2008 and, of course, I know Giampaolo [Dallara] from the 333SP days.”
Cadillac announced last week that WTR was returning to its fold as part of the expansion of its IMSA programme from two to three V-Series.Rs: WTR will run two in the GTP division and Action Express one.
WTR was referred to as Wayne Taylor Racing without the ‘with Andretti’ suffix it has used since last year, though the statement did reference its partnership with Andretti Global.
Taylor explained that this was a “historical thing” resulting from the long relationship between WTR and GM and that no decision had been made on the team name for next year.
Drivers for WTR’s 2025 IMSA campaign are expected to be announced in the wake of this year’s IMSA Petit Le Mans curtain-closer in October.
