Road America hints IMSA sports car racing after dark could come soon

The Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963 GTP of Felipe Nasr, Julien Andlauer, Laurin Heinrich races after sunset during the 2026 Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway,

Three races on the IMSA calendar involve racing in the dark, the season-opening Rolex 24 at Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring in Florida and the season-ending Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.

To consider a race concluding at dusk or after sunset – which comes about 8:15 p.m. that time of year – would require that it be run on a Saturday, Kertscher said.

“The support races, the [IMSA Michelin] Pilot [Challenge], stuff like that, could work on a Sunday,” Kertscher said. “I think people will still support it.

“So we’ll see. Let’s get through a year. We’ve talked about it loosely. I think our team and their team [are] aligned in the sense of let’s just get one under our belt, see how it works. There’s gonna be changes. It’s rare you hit something perfect the first nail out of the box, and I think we’ll get pretty close, but there’ll be changes there, no doubt.”

Endurance racing is a part of Road America’s DNA.

The Road America 500 was a staple at the track in the SCCA, United States Road Racing Championship and IMSA Camel GT races from the late 1950s through the ’80s. Since then, Grand Am ran 500-mile races in 2000 and 2001, and there have been a handful of four-hour races, including the dusk finish of 2012.

The LMP2 AO Racing ORECA of PJ Hyett and Dane Cameron races down the straightaway off Turn 3 in the 2025 IMSA Motul SportsCar Grand Prix at Road America.

Doonan, a native of the Chicago area and IMSA’s president since 2019, has frequently recalled fond memories of being at Road America for some of those events.

“With the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship converting to a 6-hour race this year at Road America, it definitely opens up some interesting possibilities that our IMSA team can and will explore with Mike Kertscher and the team at Road America,” Doonan said through a spokesman.

“How cool would it be to have our current brand of endurance racing going into the darkness? … If shifting to a window later in the day in the future makes sense to IMSA, Road America, our broadcast partners and our teams, it’s definitely worth considering.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Road America, IMSA 'loosely' discuss racing into night in Elkhart Lake