Quote:
Originally Posted by TRspitfirefan
Keep in mind that Peter Cunningham is one of the stakeholders in the series, Also Cadillac brought a lot more to the series than just two cars. They were also a major sponsor that provided safety vehicles and a lot of trackside promotion. I still don't buy the narrative that PWC actively chose to end these manufacturers involvement in the series. The recent talk of being a more privateer friendly series appears to me to be simply trying to cope with the situation. Incidentally I can't find anything in the PWC rulebook officially banning full factory programs. 
http://files.world-challenge.com/rul...egulations.pdf
Not sure why you're bringing up those two examples. The Nissan factory program ended quite some time ago, at about the same time that Ed Brown returned to IMSA with a couple of Ligier LMP2s decorated so that they sort of look like a hideous mutation of a Nissan GT-R  . The Bentley program was just scaled back a little and still continues with K-Pax.
Agreed.
While that is part of the problem, it's interesting to note that most of the growth in GTS has come from new teams or TC class teams moving up. There are only a few entries that came at the expense of a GT program. |
I know for a fact that the series told Caddy and RealTime they cannot run as factory programs..these discussions with the factory teams started during the 2016 season. The series is not reacting here, they feel they are being proactive for the benefit of the category. I disagree with them, but that's what's going on.
I brought up the Dyson and Nissan teams to just mention that they too were factory teams and would not be able to to run as factory teams today like they did in 2016. The Bentley program was scaled back
a lot after 2015, which is why Dyson stopped running the cars.