MARCH 19, 2025
Sunday, March 16, 2025 at 08:55AM 
Porsche Penske Motorsport is clearly on a roll in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class, and Nick Tandy is reaping the benefits in historic fashion. By co-driving the No. 7 Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963 with Felipe Nasr and Laurens Vanthoor to victory in the 73rd running of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, Tandy became the 10th driver to claim overall wins in international sports car racing’s three most prestigious endurance races – Sebring, the Rolex 24 At Daytona, and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Nasr crossed the line 2.239 seconds ahead of Mathieu Jaminet in the No. 6 Porsche he shared with Matt Campbell and Kevin Estre as Porsche Penske Motorsport earned its 22nd 1-2 finish in IMSA competition and first since Road America last August. “You rarely see a sports team or operation that does a single event without any faults or mistakes, and we’ve just celebrated with 40 people who have flawlessly run a car for 36 hours at Daytona and Sebring combined,” said Tandy. “Just a testament to what Porsche and Penske have put together to allow us to go racing. It’s just incredible that we’ve had this run the last two events." Watch Extended Race Highlights from Motorsports on NBC here. (Thank you to John Oreovicz/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
Tom Dillmann and the No. 43 Inter Europol Competition ORECA LMP2 07 did not reach the front of the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) class field until the very end of the 10th hour of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. Dillmann, the defending WeatherTech Championship LMP2 class champion for Inter Europol with Nick Boulle, led a total of 12 out of 347 laps during Saturday’s 12-hour endurance contest in the car he is sharing with Bijoy Garg and Jeremy Clarke. But they crucially included the last eight, as Dillmann crossed the finish line 1.117 seconds ahead of Sebastien Bourdais (along with John Farano and Sebastian Alvarez) in the No. 8 ORECA prepared by Tower Motorsport. (Thank you to John Oreovicz/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
Saturday’s 73rd running of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring saw the No. 77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) stay among the Grand Touring Daytona Pro (GTD PRO) class leaders all day, ultimately taking the point for good during a series of pit stops in the final hour. German driver Laurin Heinrich held off the pair of super-fast Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVOs that also spent the majority of the day up front in class, winning by 4.907 seconds over the No. 48 Paul Miller Racing BMW, driven by German Max Hesse, Brit Dan Harper and Finn Jesse Krohn. The No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVO co-driven by the American trio of Madison Snow, Neil Verhagen and Connor De Phillippi finished third. (Thank you to Holly Cain/IMSA Wire Service)
(IMSA)
In Grand Touring Daytona (GTD), Swiss driver Phillip Ellis pulled off perhaps the most dramatic move of the race to victory in the closing laps, his No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 passing Brit Jack Hawksworth in the No. 12 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3 with less than 15 minutes remaining in the race. The GTD class provided one of the more dramatic race outcomes with Ellis invoking a NASCAR-style “bump-and-run,” bumper tap on the leading No. 12 Lexus. The contact in Turn 5 was enough to allow him to maneuver around and pull away from what was a tight chase all day. The No. 27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo finished third. next up for GTD competitors is the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, April 11-12, while GTD PRO is off until the WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in Monterey, May 9-11. (Thank you to Holly Cain/IMSA Wire Service)
(MotoGP.com)
By AE Special Contributor Whit Bazemore
Bend. If you happen to be a MotoGP racer not named Marquez, well, too bad for you. Because you are simply getting your ass handed to you on a silver platter. And it’s not a pretty picture.
For the second race in a row, and the second race weekend of 2025, the Marquez Bros, 8-time World Champion Marc, 32 (six in the premier class, MotoGP), and younger brother Alex, 28, two-time World Champion (one each in Moto3 and Moto2), dominated in crushing fashion. They have locked out the first two steps of the podium in all four races (the Saturday afternoon half distance and half points “sprint” races, as well as Sunday’s main Grands Prix) thus far in 2025. They simply ride off into the distance, with a gap by the end of the first lap. It’s an unprecedented performance, no matter if they are brothers or not.
While Marc’s dominating results on the factory Ducati are somewhat unsurprising, Brother Alex being the best of the rest (on a non-factory version of the same GP-24 Ducati for the Gresini team) is a revelation. And it’s a good revelation, a feel-good story.
By every metric, Alex is an excellent racer. He’s won two lower class championships, he’s won many races (although, after four years, his breakthrough first MotoGP win is still in the future). He is quick, and he is smart. But he is not Marc Marquez. No one else is either, but that simple fact does not keep Alex from being constantly compared to Marc, way more than everyone else combined.
Alex has spent his entire career (if not his entire life) in Brother Marc’s ominous shadow. Following in the footsteps of a racer widely regarded as the best of this generation, if not in history, is never ideal. Spending a career trying to achieve the impossible (being as great as your brother) can obviously be very detrimental. It will cause doubt. And when your goal is to be the best in the world, or maybe not even the best in the world, but simply “good,” in the most competitive form of Motorsport, there is no place for self-doubt. Self-doubt is self-defeating. You might as well not even get out of bed on race day.
There are, however, two sides to every coin, and the upside is that Alex has been exposed to every-single-detail, both physical and mental, that makes brother Marc so great. Simply put, it’s an immense educational opportunity unavailable to everyone but Alex.
He seems to have been paying attention. He is realistic. He knows how great Marc is, but at the Gran Premio de Argentina at Termas de Rio Hondo, Alex took a fight to his older brother that no one else could. Leading for much of the race, Alex appeared smoothly in control, but it was easy to think that perhaps Marc was just cruising in second, lying in wait, and ready to pounce. But by mid-race, the trained eye could see that Marc was at times on the ragged edge, even over it, twice saving near-certain crashes. Alex’s pace was such that the great older brother was having to dig deep to stay close.
But Alex was having to push just as hard, even if was not entirely obvious, and by the last 6 or 7 laps had started to lose some tire performance. Marc, still on the ragged edge, was able to pass Alex for the lead on the second of two attempts with five laps to go. Alex stayed close, and with his current performance, kept his brother honest to the checkered flag.
It was Marc’s 90th MotoGP victory, and tied him with the great Spanish racer Angel Nieto for third on the all-time wins list.
Former Moto2 Champ and MotoGP standout from the 2020 season, Franky Morbidelli finished an exciting and popular third, while Marc’s factory Ducati teammate, Pecco Bagnaia, was a disappointed fourth. Frenchman Johan Zarco gave a rebounding Honda team it’s second-best non-Marquez result in five years with an excellent fifth. (Alex Rins surprisingly won the US GP on a Honda in 2023.)
But the story of Argentina is the dominating Marquez brothers, and the rise in competitiveness of Alex. Just how good will he be? As of now, no one actually expects him to be able to fight his brother tooth and nail for a championship, but then no one actually saw him as a contender this preseason either. It’s MotoGP, and the fact that anything can, and will, happen is what keeps the championship so interesting, even in times of domination like what we are seeing now.
After the race, Marc said, “My brother is my biggest competitor now.”
And after a lifetime in the shadows, for Alex Marquez, those have to be the best words he’s ever heard.
Editor's Note: This is our dearly departed billboard, which we had at Road America for several years. Peter gifted the phrase "America's National Park of Speed" to the track, which now uses it proudly in all of its communications. -WG
Editor's Note: Click on "Next 1 Entries" at the bottom of this page to see previous issues. - WG