DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.  With the opening race weekend of the 2025 season in the books, there have already been significant accolades achieved across four different IMSA-sanctioned championships.

Reflecting on Daytona, we saw so many of our competitors achieve great success through incredible, close on-track competition right up to the finish and saw even more great stories told across our broadcast, digital and social platforms, said IMSA President John Doonan. Its remarkable to see what the IMSA community collectively achieved to kick off the new season of IMSA.

7 Manufacturers Win

Of IMSAs 18 auto manufacturers, seven (Porsche, Ford, Chevrolet, McLaren, Hyundai, Toyota, Mazda) already have a win to kick off the new year. That number increases to 12 (Acura, Aston Martin, Audi, Ferrari, BMW) with at least one podium finish in the four series that raced at Daytona.

In the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, five of the 11 different manufacturers entered either won or made the podium in the Rolex 24 At Daytona.

Porsche (Grand Touring Prototype, GTP), Ford (Grand Touring Daytona Pro, GTD PRO) and Chevrolet (Grand Touring Daytona, GTD) won their classes, with each brand placing at least one other car on the podium across classes. Acura (GTP) and Aston Martin (GTD) also made the top three to kick off the year.

BMW narrowly missed a podium, but did score the first GTP pole of the year, while Ford (GTD PRO) and Porsche (GTD) won the other two.

McLaren (Grand Sport, GS) and Hyundai (Touring Car, TCR) scored wins in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge opener, the four-hour BMW M Endurance Challenge, with Porsche and Ford (GS) and Audi (TCR) also on podiums.

Porsche (Grand Touring Daytona X, GTDX) and Toyota (Grand Sport X, GSX) won the two manufacturer classes in the pair of 45-minute VP Racing SportsCar Challenge races. Ferrari (GTDX), Ford and BMW (GSX) scored VP Challenge podiums as well.

Close Competition

Each of the four classes in the Rolex 24 had multiple cars on the lead lap with margins of victory under two seconds in three of the four.

The GTP class saw three cars on the lead lap with a 1.335-second margin of victory. In GTD PRO, those numbers were seven on the lead lap and a 1.909-second margin of victory. In GTD, nine finished on the lead lap with a 1.454-second margin of victory. LMP2s revised finishing order produced a closer result, with the margin of victory of 6.716 seconds between the two cars on the lead lap.

Most of the 61 cars had a turn at the front of the field, too, with 47 of 61 cars leading at least one lap. In both GTP and LMP2, 10 of the 12 cars entered led at least one lap. In GTD PRO, 10 of 15 cars led at least one lap there and in GTD, that number increased to 17 of 22 cars.

The competition wasnt limited to being close during the race. It also proved itself during qualifying on Thursday.

The first 15 cars in GTD, comprising eight of the nine manufacturers entered, qualified within 0.958 of a second in the first race with new torque sensors introduced to the field. The ninth GT manufacturer, Ford, showed its pace by sweeping the front row in GTD PRO qualifying as the top six cars in that category covering four manufacturers, were within 0.922 of a second. In GTP, four of the five brands qualified within 0.537 of a second down to sixth place.

Viewership Increases

Per NBC Sports, IMSA coverage across NBC and USA windows and Peacock streaming coverage increased compared to 2024, with Sundays closing segment of the Rolex 24 delivering Peacocks most streamed IMSA event on record.

Sunday coverage across NBC and Peacock averaged a Total Audience Delivery (TAD) of 899,000 viewers, up 133 percent from the weighted average of 2024 NBC and USA windows, including Peacock and digital simulstreams (385,000 TAD viewers).

The three linear simulstreamed window on NBC (two telecasts) and USA (one) averaged a TAD of 491,000 viewers, up 31 percent from 2024.

Digital Growth

Across IMSAs official YouTube channel and additional social media channels (Instagram, Facebook, X, TikTok), more than 54 million views and nearly four million engagements were achieved in the first month of the season across both organic and collaborative posts.

This covered a mix of unique social and digital content offerings, including original content, an NBC Sports IMSA Season Preview show, five races from three series across the Roar Before the Rolex 24 and Rolex 24 At Daytona weekends, a full field drone photo and video package, the first two IMSA Endurance Hour Podcasts, and the first live race stream of the Rolex 24 on IMSAs YouTube channel for an international audience.

By the end of the race, the Rolex 24 broadcast on YouTube accumulated 2,930,130 Total Live Views, and the number surpassed the 3 million mark with Video On Demand (VOD) content added in. The Rolex 24 also achieved 131,520 Peak Concurrent viewers. The level of views and engagement, as IMSA chatted during the race with fans, resulted in 133,000 Chat Messages. These records smashed previous high-water marks of 505,000 Total Live Views and 22,000 Peak Concurrent viewers achieved at Sebring 2024 when YouTube live programming was first launched.