Multi-class contenders — Nick Tandy's Porsche GT expertise headlining the GTD Pro effort, while an LMP2 entry gives the team transatlantic depth.
Nick Tandy won the 2025 12 Hours of Sebring overall in the #6 Porsche 963 GTP alongside Nasr and Vanthoor. In 2026, he steps down to the GTD Pro class in AO Racing's #77 Porsche 911 GT3 R — still on Porsche rubber, still at Sebring, but now hunting GT class honors rather than the outright win. His Sebring knowledge is as good as anyone's.
One Porsche 911 GT3 R in GTD Pro and one ORECA LMP2 in LMP2
AO Racing is a multi-class IMSA team that fields entries in both GTD Pro and LMP2 simultaneously at Sebring — a significant logistical and operational challenge that requires two separate engineering teams, two pit crews, two sets of equipment, and precise coordination to avoid resource conflicts during the race.
Teams that can operate across multiple classes gain valuable experience in IMSA's unique multi-class format — understanding how their different cars relate to each other on track, how to manage traffic across the classes, and how to allocate resources when both cars need attention simultaneously.
The #77 Porsche 911 GT3 R is AO Racing's flagship entry, featuring Nick Tandy as the headlining professional driver. The GT3 R is Porsche's current-generation GT3 customer racing car — a finely developed, highly competitive GT machine that won at Sebring in GTP form in 2025.
The Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) is Porsche's current GT3 customer racing car, based on the 992-generation 911. It uses a 4.2-liter naturally aspirated flat-6 engine producing around 550 horsepower — the same basic architecture that defines the 911's character, now optimized for GT3 racing regulations.
The GT3 R competes in GTD Pro (all-professional drivers) and GTD (pro-am drivers) classes in IMSA, as well as equivalent GT3 series worldwide. Porsche's customer racing program is one of the largest in the world — hundreds of GT3 R cars are operated by customer teams across dozens of championships globally.
GTD Pro is IMSA's second-tier GT class, where all three drivers must hold Gold or Platinum FIA driver ratings — meaning all-professional lineups. This creates a highly competitive environment where team preparation, pit stop execution, and strategic decisions are the primary differentiators, since driver skill levels are broadly comparable. Nick Tandy's Porsche factory pedigree is about as good as it gets in this class.
Nick Tandy is one of Porsche's most celebrated factory drivers — a British racer who has spent his entire career in Porsche machinery, winning GT class races at Le Mans and Sebring, and accumulating an extraordinary record of results across IMSA, WEC, and GT series worldwide. His 2025 Sebring GTP victory was the pinnacle of his factory career to date, and his return to Sebring in 2026 — now in the GT3 R — shows his continued commitment to the event.
Having won the GTP class outright in 2025, Tandy competes in GTD Pro in 2026 with the AO Racing Porsche customer program. Going from the top-spec prototype to a GT3 car is a common move for Porsche factory drivers who support multiple programs simultaneously. Tandy's intimate knowledge of Sebring's layout, combined with Porsche's GT3 preparation, makes the #77 a serious GTD Pro contender.
Running two entries in different classes at the same event multiplies complexity. Each class car has different tire compounds, different fuel strategies, different pit stop procedures, and potentially conflicting in-lap timing. AO Racing's engineering team must manage both cars simultaneously — including the possibility that both need to pit within the same race window, requiring precise choreography to avoid crew conflicts and lane blockages.