Corvette “should be right at front” in Long Beach GTD Pro fight

Taylor, who won the IMSA support race at the Grand Prix of Long Beach three straight years while driving for Wayne Taylor Racing in the Prototype division, took pole in GTD Pro last year, despite it being the C8.R’s first street race in the category. Previously, the Corvettes had been in the now-defunct GT Le Mans class, so 2022 was the first season of the C8.R as a GT3 model.

Taylor and co-driver Antonio Garcia only lost the lead when they served a drive-through penalty when the car’s wheelnut flew out of the wheelgun during the scheduled stop, and was hurled into the Pfaff Motorsports Porsche’s radiator. On the basis that the team now have more than a season’s worth of experience with the C8.R in GT3 form, Taylor is confident that the mid-engined car is ready to pick up from where it left off, at the head of the GTD Pro class.

“Last year we had a great car. We were on the pole and led for the whole first stint and then had that crazy fluke incident on pitlane which kind of put us out of contention for the win. It would be nice to go back there and be as competitive as we were and execute as well as we did last year.

“Having a year under our belt with this car and this class, we learned a lot throughout last season that already has been beneficial this year. I’m looking forward to getting back there and seeing what we learned throughout 2022 and be able to put that to good use once the sprint races start.

“The car honestly was great to drive all year. We’d leave sessions and be nitpicking things to work on here and there… little bit of understeer, little bit of oversteer. We were just off the pace. It was hard to kind of exploit the pace of the car without taking huge measures. At some tracks we went to, we had big setup swings to try things, but for the most part it never really worked…

“We still do a lot of work in the simulator prepping for each event. We always go into the weekends with a strong car… I have a lot of confidence going to Long Beach. We had a good car last year and have made strides since then. We should be right at the front of the pack.”

Asked which cars he expects to offer the strongest opposition around the 1.968-mile street course, Taylor replied, “The Porsche got a pretty big [Balance of Performance] change for Sebring, and they were obviously super-fast. In Practice One, the GTD car [Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R] was fastest overall and the #9 [Pfaff Porsche] car never really showed speed until it needed to. So I feel like they’ve got some stuff in hand to show when they need to.

“The Mercedes was strong all year last year, so I’m sure they’ll be strong now that they have two proper pros in the car for the sprint races. When you look at Sebring and Daytona, a lot of different cars were competitive so our eyes are on everybody at this point.”