Cadillac Chip Ganassi Racing expands their programme for the 2022 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season.
They will run two Cadillac DPi-V.R cars in the DPi category, as preparation for 2023, with new LMDh cars coming from the American car manufacturer.
There will be changes to what is known as the #01 line-up this year. Kevin Magnussen won’t be racing for the team, since his Peugeot contract in the FIA World Endurance Championship has first priority.
His teammate, Renger van der Zande will continue racing for the team.
French driver Sebastien Bourdais will move to the Cadillac Chip Ganassi team, after having raced for JDC-Miller Motorsports and Action Express in the past. The former Formula 1 driver has raced for the CGR team in the past, being a part of the Ford GTLM/GTE programme, including a win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2016.
Photo Courtesy of IMSA / Jake Galstad
The third driver for the team is Alex Lynn. The Brit has been in and out of sportscar racing several times, throughout the last few seasons. He has quite recent LMP2 experience from the 24 Hours of Le Mans 2021, where he was part of the United Autosports outfit. He won the GTE Pro category for Aston Martin Racing in the previous edition of the race. He has experience from Formula E, so he knows about electric drive trains, re-gen and energy management, which will be an important part of the LMDh future.
The last of the full-season driver will be Earl Bamber. The Kiwi is probably mostly known for his Porsche GT outings, but was part of the Le Mans-winning trio in 2015 onboard the Porsche 919 Hybrid. He has been a long time Porsche employee, and has his own race team, running Porsche GT cars. He did however lose the status as Porsche works driver at the end of 2020, when Porsche cut down on the driver roster following the COVID-19 situation – something that hit his 2015 winning teammate Nick Tandy, plus 2018 GTE Pro Le Mans winner and later World Championship Michael Christensen too. It’s the first time for Bamber to race a DPi car, while the others all have at least two weekends of experience.
The team has not yet announced the exact driver pairings, nor the endurance drivers for the longer rounds in the IMSA championship. Those announcements will be made prior to the ROAR Before The 24, which will run mid-January 2022. Scott Dixon has been the third driver of the #01 at the endurance rounds in 2021.
