Okay, here are my preliminary evaluations for the 2026 IMSA season, which finished four weeks ago at the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. My overall statistical table is here, but I’ve decided to capture screenshots for the drivers in all four classes before I summarize my first draft opinions on each of their seasons, which I will likely revise and clarify for the actual top 200 list. I then provided a letter grade at the end for all the drivers I went through in the three series I finished evaluating (IndyCar, Formula E, and IMSA), although there are a number of worthy Formula E drivers whose exact tier groups won’t be known until I integrate their sports car data from other series.
The most important way to evaluate sports car drivers in my opinion is based on the differences between each driver’s speed percentile and that of their teammates, but obviously marquee wins are extremely important (and probably more important than the actual championships) and you can really tell which driver(s) on a given sports car team are pulling their weight and which aren’t based on comparing drivers’ lead change records. I went through every driver who I thought had a significant case for the list based on only their IMSA data (although I’m sure there are drivers whose IMSA seasons aren’t deserving despite deserving WEC seasons, and I’ll deal with them later).
I provided screenshots for my advanced statistics for each class, but I had to zoom out to such an extent that you’ll either need to squint to read them or right-click on the images and open them in a new tab. While I managed to include every GTP driver here, I had to crop a lot of drivers in the other three classes since there were simply too many drivers. I decided to make sure I cropped the remaining drivers for the LMP2, GTD Pro, and GTD classes low enough on the list so that everybody who did basically anything in a given class appears in this article, so you don’t have to click back and forth between the link to my spreadsheet and here.
GTP
Aitken and Heinrich were obviously the best drivers in IMSA this year, as they combined to lead nearly all statistical categories, with Aitken leading in natural races led, lead shares, cumulative races led, poles, fastest laps, fastest races, and speed percentile, and Heinrich leading in lead change record, wins, terminal natural leads, and races with the most lead shares. The only category neither of those drivers led was races with the most laps led, which went to Felipe Nasr, who actually led the most laps in all three races Heinrich won. Interestingly, Aitken and Heinrich finished first and second in the points standings by themselves because Aitken’s teammate Bamber skipped two races and Heinrich spent time in three different cars, which is very unusual since normally two drivers share each position, especially in the prototype classes.
So, do I like Aitken or Heinrich better? Aitken definitely seems to have the better numbers, but I think Heinrich was better when considering the season holistically. Even though Aitken won the title and Heinrich finished second, Heinrich won both the 24 Hours of Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring with Nasr and Julien Andlauer and while I wouldn’t say this in most other disciplines, the sports car marquee races are more important to drivers’ legacies than titles. Heinrich also had an undefeated lead change record at 4-0 (better than Aitken’s 4-2), he tied Sheldon van der Linde for the most TNL, and Heinrich drove three different cars and was the linchpin of his team, outperforming his teammates every time. While Aitken beat Bamber by 19 percentage points in speed and crushed him in lead change record (4-2 to 0-4; Bamber was kind of embarrassing since he got passed for the win four times), Heinrich had an even bigger advantage over Nasr and Andlauer, beating them by 27 and 31 percentage points, and they shared in his marquee race wins and Nasr led a lot, so I think that’s more impressive. Heinrich > Aitken is actually a no-brainer, I think, though they both obviously deserve Es.
Van der Linde and Yelloly absolutely thrashed their teammates as well, with van der Linde beating D. Vanthoor by 26 percentage points, Wittmann by 30, and Eng by 42 in speed. With an undefeated lead change record and numbers that are only barely behind Aitken’s even though his car seemed to be slower, you could argue he should be an E also since his car finished 6th while their team car finished 13th in points, and he was obviously the linchpin of the team. Yelloly was the second-fastest driver in the class, beating Blomqvist by 19 points, his co-driver van der Zande by 36, and Colin Braun by 39. Now, I’ve stated before in their bubble entries that I think Blomqvist is overrated and Braun seems to be past his prime, but Yelloly utterly destroyed them in addition to also earning a class win at Le Mans. I think I’m going to deny Yelloly the full E because he had no passes for the lead while van der Zande somehow actually led more, but I think it’s an E- for sure since his car did finish 3rd while the Blomqvist/Braun car finished only 11th in points and he crushed all the other Meyer Shank drivers in general in addition to also having a Le Mans win, which none of them had.
As for those guys’ co-drivers, I guess I should list Nasr, even as slow as he was because he did lead the most laps at both Daytona and Sebring and he had the pass for the win at Sebring (Heinrich obviously did at Daytona), but he was so far behind Heinrich in both speed and passing that it’ll probably have to be a C-. Andlauer doesn’t really seem to have a case. Bamber getting passed for the win four times with no on-track lead changes is really bad, and being 19 percentage points behind Aitken isn’t great either, but he’s still fourth in lead shares and second in CRL, so I’ll reluctantly put him in the C- category also. Blomqvist did win two poles and demolished Braun in speed, but Yelloly demolished him, so Blomqvist is at best C-. I’ll put him on the bubble for this year regardless, but I might drop him. None of the other BMW drivers besides van der Linde deserve it based on their IMSA performances, although when I throw in the WEC performances as well, that might change my evaluations of the BMW drivers and Bamber.
Albuquerque did pass Aitken for the win at Road America, but the Wayne Taylor drivers did next to nothing otherwise, and Jordan and Ricky have really fallen into complacency since returning to their father’s team. Albuquerque’s 45.16 was faster than Ricky’s 39.53 and Jordan’s 33.28, but Delétraz was actually faster than any of them at 52.86, and that’s surprising to me. Nonetheless, I’ll tentatively slot Albuquerque in C- as well.
And then that leaves Kévin Estre. The arguably-greatest-sports-car-driver-in-the-world had been snakebitten in his IMSA starts, improbably taking 32 starts to finally win the season finale of his first full-time prototype season at the Petit Le Mans. Considering the Penske drivers’ dominance at the endurance races, this kind of feels like underachievement since Heinrich at 75.83 was faster than Estre’s 67.47, although Estre was still a lot faster than Andlauer and Nasr. I’d say C+ for him. There are no other realistic contenders except for drivers I decide to rate primarily for performance in other series.
LMP2
This class is weird because it has so many amateurs in it and the amateurs tend to start the race before the professionals finish, which means sometimes amateurs get rewarded in my lead change statistics for passing other amateurs, which makes them look substantially better than they are. Like Goikhberg ended up with the best lead change record at 3-0 because he passed the even worse Goldburg three times, but neither of them is particularly good, so you have to just throw out all the amateur drivers when evaluating this.
Although his amateur co-driver Clarke actually led more because he won four poles, Dillmann led the pros in pretty much every statistical category in addition to sharing in Yelloly’s LMP2 Le Mans class win. Dillmann’s an obvious no-brainer for this year’s list, but Dillmann and Clarke did lose the title to Quinn and his amateur driver Kurtz, who also combined to win the 24 Hours of Daytona and Petit Le Mans while Dillmann had no marquee race wins (except of course Le Mans in the WEC). This class always has the worst competition as well. I think I’m going to award Dillmann’s better numbers and versatility over Quinn’s title and greater number of marquee race wins, but I’m going to have them pretty close and they’ll probably both be C+.
Sowery is probably one of the most underrated drivers in the world today. Although he never got the serious IndyCar shot I kind of felt he deserved (he is rated a very good .070 in my open wheel model right now thanks to beating David Malukas in some IndyCar minor league feeder. I’m not gonna say Sowery is better than Malukas now obviously, but it would’ve been cool to see him get more IndyCar opportunities. Sowery co-drove with Quinn and Kurtz in both of their wins and put up almost the exact same numbers despite two fewer starts. He deserves a C+ too.
I usually list Jensen, but I think the season wasn’t good enough. Despite his Sebring win and TNL, he and Fayer never finished better than 7th outside of that. More interesting is Jakobsen, who started only the 24 Hours of Daytona, had the fastest lap, and made the last two passes for the lead against Formula E champion da Costa and IndyCar rising star Rasmussen, while Jensen’s pass for the lead came against IndyCar bust Vautier, which… who cares? Jakobsen also won the LMP2 Pro-Am title in the European Le Mans Series, which is at least worth something. However, a pro-am title isn’t worth as much as a fully professional title and the LMP2 class in IMSA is also pretty bad. I’m thinking C.
Cameron is past his prime, but his numbers are pretty solid. 3rd in both lead shares and CRL and also he ranked third in the standings amongst professional drivers who won a race. That’s probably strong enough to list barely, so pencil him in for C-.
I was kind of shaky about whether Rasmussen belonged on the list this year because even though he was very strong in the IndyCar oval races, his championship finish was abysmal, but he had the fourth-most laps led at Daytona and the second-most at Indianapolis, which he won, so I think that confirms he deserves a C- too.
Edgar was very fast and has good numbers, but he is currently leading the WEC LMGT3 standings by himself, so I’m going to wait until the WEC season is over to decide what to do about him.
That leaves di Resta; the former F1 driver and teammate to Dario Franchitti, who was somehow the fastest driver in the class with three fastest races despite never having an on-track pass for the lead. I think he was let down because Goldburg was so awful, although di Resta was basically single-handedly responsible for Goldburg being third in points even though di Resta didn’t get to share in it because he missed one race. Let’s say C-.
GTD Pro
As usual, this is a mess since this class typically has the most even competition of any class and it seems like nobody stood out as different drivers shone in different categories. For as much as I talk about LMP2 being the weakest class, I think the stronger performers were more obvious, which is why I’m going to have Dillmann, Quinn, and Sowery in the top 100 and probably all drivers I choose from here will be either C or C-.
Verhagen and De Phillippi won the title as well as the 24 Hours of Daytona, but De Phillippi’s numbers are honestly too bad to list. Verhagen probably had the most consistent numbers across the board and I’d probably say he was the best driver in the class. I had him in the C tier last year and I guess I will again, even though his advanced numbers are worse against what I would say is weaker competition.
Barnicoat and Hawksworth led almost all the statistical categories and did win twice, but they didn’t win marquee races and they both had below-average speed. Still, Barnicoat’s 4-1 lead change record is pretty dominant and he generally outperformed Hawksworth in most statistical categories overall even though Hawksworth was faster and both were not that fast. I guess C for Barnicoat and C- for Hawksworth.
Caldarelli and Mitchell narrowly lost the title to Verhagen and de Phillippi, and just as de Phillippi didn’t really contribute anything to the title, neither did Mitchell in his second-place points finish. Even though Caldarelli’s numbers were basically comparable to Verhagen’s, I think I have to put Caldarelli a tier down from Verhagen since Verhagen won the title, the 24 Hours of Daytona, and the Michelin Endurance Cup while Caldarelli’s wins only came in minor races. C- for him.
I think Sims is the only Corvette driver who probably deserves it. He was the fastest driver and he has substantially better numbers than Catsburg, García, and Milner overall, even if none of them were amazing. C- probably.
King was the fastest driver by nearly 10 percentage points and beat his co-driver Tandy (who made my top 25 just last year) by 30 percentage points, even though Tandy led more and had better passing numbers. Considering how highly I had Tandy rated last year, I think King gets a C.
Preining, Engel, and Feller are obviously list-worthy, but I’ll wait until I discuss DTM before talking about them. Drudi probably also is since he also won some GT World Challenge endurance races, but I’ll deal with that later.
Despite only starting five races, Bachler had a stellar 3-0 lead change record and won at Sebring. He was definitely a step down from Preining, but only very slightly. I decided after the fact that he should’ve been C- this year, so he probably should again this year.
GTD
I had to shrink this one to capture a screenshot consisting of all the drivers I wanted. This year had a real oligopoly as Ellis, Fuoco, and Gamble all had more passes for the lead than any driver this season in any IMSA class with Ellis and Fuoco at 8-3 and Gamble at 7-4. Fuoco would have been ahead at 9-3 if I hadn’t nullified his pass where he cut off and wrecked Patrese at the Petit Le Mans simultaneously, for which he was penalized.
Deciding whether to rate Ellis or Fuoco higher is difficult because Ellis utterly dominated the season and his Winward Racing teammates Ward and Dontje did literally nothing. Ellis and Ward have always been wildly mismatched teammates, but probably never more so than this year. In addition to running away with the title, Ellis won at Daytona and the Petit Le Mans also, and he made passes for the lead in both. Fuoco was nowhere near as consistent, but posting the same lead change record despite only starting 5 races to Ellis’s 11 is impressive, particularly because Fuoco obviously faced stronger competition since he only entered the endurance races while Ellis feasted on the less competitive and smaller GTD fields. Fuoco was faster, but Ellis had way better numbers otherwise. Fuoco did have one of the highlights of the season by passing Gamble for the win on the last lap at the 12 Hours of Sebring, and he also won a WEC event. However, Fuoco is nowhere near the WEC title chase, but he’s probably the fastest driver on his WEC team as usual. I think at the moment, I’m going to put both Fuoco and Ellis in the E- tier, but I might promote Fuoco up to E based on his performances against his IMSA teammates.
Gamble’s advanced numbers were definitely in the same league, but he was basically the hard luck driver of the year. Much like David Malukas, he was very fast but it seemed like a cartoon anvil fell on him all year as he failed to win and finished 10th in points, although that was in part because he skipped two races that his teammate Eduardo Barrichello (who finished third in points) started. I have to take Gamble a tier below the other two even though he was the fastest driver in the GTD class because Ellis and Fuoco both won marquee races and multiple races across all series, while Gamble didn’t win at all and Ellis and Fuoco both passed him for wins. Additionally, Ellis and Fuoco blew out their teammates significantly worse than Gamble did, as Barrichello surprisingly led all drivers in CRL, races with the most laps led, and poles, even though Gamble was 20 points faster, ranked second in lead shares, and narrowly edged out Ellis for second in CRL (they tied to the hundredth decimal place). I’m thinking C+ for Gamble and C- for Barrichello, but I could easily drop him.
Patrese was fast and had good numbers, but he finished 13th in the championship and his co-driver Albert Costa was eighth. Even though Patrese’s numbers were better than Costa, I think Costa with a 5-3 lead change record was better than Patrese at 1-0. I kind of think neither of them deserve it, but both are close.
Robichon’s numbers are sneakily very good also, but I do think they pale to both his co-drivers Gamble and Barrichello.
Wickens got a full lead share for winning the pole at Long Beach, and while I’m gobsmacked he managed to do that as a paraplegic, I don’t think the season is good enough.
I guess I should do Foley since he was second in points and 26 points ahead of his co-driver Gallagher, but I’m not super enthused about it. Mark him down for C-.
E: Jack Aitken, Laurin Heinrich, Kyle Kirkwood, Álex Palou, Oliver Rowland, Sheldon van der Linde, Pascal Wehrlein
E-: Taylor Barnard, Philip Ellis, Antonio Fuoco, Christian Lundgaard, David Malukas, Edoardo Mortara, Nick Yelloly
C+: Tom Dillmann, Marcus Ericsson, Kévin Estre, Mitch Evans, Tom Gamble, Scott McLaughlin, Pato O’Ward, Alex Quinn, Felix Rosenqvist, Toby Sowery, Rinus VeeKay
C: Ben Barnicoat, Lucas di Grassi, Malthe Jakobsen, Harry King, Nico Müller, Josef Newgarden, Will Power, Neil Verhagen
C-: Filipe Albuquerque, Marcus Armstrong, Klaus Bachler, Earl Bamber, Tom Blomqvist, Andrea Caldarelli, Dane Cameron, Paul di Resta, Robby Foley, Jack Hawksworth, Pepe Martí, Felipe Nasr, Christian Rasmussen, Alexander Sims, Dan Ticktum
Other Formula E/IMSA drivers I’m certain I’m listing, but I want to wait until I’ve finished the WEC/GT World Challenge statistical tables to decide on their exact placements (I might not even attempt to do a GT World Challenge statistical table because that series still doesn’t provide post-race lap times):
Sébastien Buemi, Nick Cassidy, Nyck de Vries, Jake Dennis, António Félix da Costa, Jonny Edgar
It’s likely some of the drivers I have rejected based on their IMSA seasons I will accept based on their WEC seasons too, but since I haven’t calculated any WEC data yet and won’t until after the season ends next weekend, I’m going to wait to rate all those guys.
Here’s five-year-old me dressed as a pirate for Halloween in 1990:
My vision in my left eye was so bad at 20/400 when I started elementary school that I needed to wear an eye patch at all times, but my parents came up with a clever use for it here…