The first match of the 2025 IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship, run by the International Sports Association, had gone so smoothly for the Action Express Cadillac team. His car was rapidly fighting and ran for the lead. But then, about halfway through Rolex 24 in Daytona, which started on January 25, everything went wrong.
A suspension section in the group’s Cadillac V-Series.R failed, putting the Danish driver Frederik Vesti in a crash. Repairs followed, but every opportunity to win was left. The team that won the IMSA and Driver Group titles just two years ago had been prevented again.
But now, as Action Express is preparing for the second round of the season in the twelve hours of Sebring this week, the victory of the race and the glory of the team’s title and the hopes of glory are not lost.
“We ended up in Daytona, but certainly not what we felt as we had won,” said Gary Nelson, director of the Action Express team, in an interview last month. “We are still waiting to win this year, with all the job we have done in our car.”
Action Express is directed to Sebring with a lower order of driving compared to the four runners who entered Daytona. Vesti will fight with Jack Aitken and Earl Bamber.
“More than other pieces, there is a little freedom for the driver to try different things and find his own way in Sebring,” Aitken said in an interview. “The piece is brutal but it is a cool place.”
Action Express knows how to win in Sebring ,. The team has won three times in the day-night race since 2015 and had another victory there in the match reduced by the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. “And over the years, we’ve learned this. Every time we won, we were the strongest in the end when the piece cooled.”
Although claimed that these two IMSA titles in 2023, Action Express did not win the championship from the Sebring match, also in 2023.
Nelson puts the success of Action Express’ 2023 until the “simplistic approach to new technology” for cars introduced into the new top class of the IMSA Grand Touring prototype that year. These cars are powered by hybrid engines that use electric systems, including braking.
“Most of the teams competed with braking in 2023 – rejuvenating electricity when it slows down to load the battery,” Nelson said. “Our team got a simpler approach and said:” It may not be Regen as well as other teams, but we will also have no brake issues that other groups have. “It’s easy to go to the ice cream store and order one of everything, but it is probably not good for you.”
The team was held to win the title 2023 by 21 points, from a total of 2733. In 2024, it ended fourth and did not win after a series of crashes. “The other teams had also taken a step forward,” Aitken said. “We also did, but we made too many mistakes. You just have to hold your hands and say that.”
While the Group 2025 campaign began with a regression, Nelson and his crew are inspired by the team’s past, when in the IMSA era in 2021 the Action Express Car led to the first race in Daytona before leaving the exhaust and gearbox allegation. But the team was retrieved to win the titles of the year’s drivers and teams with a delayed resuscitation. “He went to the last round of the last race,” Nelson said. “We only made the championship from the last rounds of the season. We don’t stop, we don’t give up. We just continue to push and push.”
