BMW's New IMSA Team Wins at Last With a Five-Minutes-to-Go Pass at Indy
Sheldon van der Linde used lapped traffic to dive past Earl Bamber's Cadillac five minutes from the flag, sealing WRT's first win since taking over BMW's GTP program.
Sheldon van der Linde waited until barely five minutes remained on the clock to decide the Battle on the Bricks. Diving inside Earl Bamber's Cadillac at Turn 12 of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, the South African handed BMW M Team WRT its first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory — in the Belgian squad's debut season running BMW's factory GTP program.
Bamber and Jack Aitken had controlled most of the two-hour, 40-minute race in the No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R after getting past Tom Blomqvist's pole-winning Acura. Van der Linde, sharing the No. 24 BMW M Hybrid V8 with Dries Vanthoor, used slower GT traffic to spring the decisive move and crossed the line 2.926 seconds clear, according to NBC Sports.
The result caps a steady climb for WRT, which took over BMW's IMSA prototype effort from Rahal Letterman Lanigan this year. It was the team's fourth GTP podium of the season and its first win, and BMW's second overall victory at Indianapolis after the 2024 triumph under the RLL banner. The M Hybrid V8 had been quick all season without converting — until now.
"It was right here in Indianapolis that we had our first discussions about an IMSA GTP programme. To be celebrating this victory here now is incredible," said WRT team principal Vincent Vosse.
BMW bills it as van der Linde's maiden IMSA win, though NBC Sports notes he scored a GTD class victory back in 2017 — either way, it's his first overall. Vanthoor already had one on his record from Road America in 2025 with the RLL operation. The sister No. 25 car of Marco Wittmann and Philipp Eng finished 10th after Wittmann served a drive-through penalty for contact with an Aston Martin, a mistake he owned after the race. Aitken still leaves Indianapolis with a roughly 147-point championship lead, per Speed Sport.
Turner ends a two-year drought
There was a second BMW celebration in GTD. Robby Foley and Patrick Gallagher took the No. 96 Turner Motorsport BMW M4 GT3 EVO to the team's 26th class win — its first since Road America in August 2024 and its first at Indianapolis. BMW says the result also vaults the pair into the GTD points lead heading into the finale.
Paul Miller Racing's day went the other way. The No. 1 M4 GT3 EVO of Neil Verhagen and Connor De Phillippi ran with the GTD PRO leaders for most of the afternoon before being hit repeatedly in the closing stages and shuffled back to sixth, costing the crew its class points lead.
Both title fights now come down to Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta in two weeks. Turner arrives on top of GTD, Paul Miller needs a recovery drive in GTD PRO — and WRT finally has the win that proves its transatlantic expansion works.
