DALLAS – The famed GAINSCO Auto Insurance Red Dragon will return to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship next year through a sponsorship agreement with JDC-Miller Motorsports.
GAINSCO Auto Insurance will sponsor the No. 99 ORECA/Gibson driven by Misha Goikhberg, Stephen Simpson and Chris Miller for the full WeatherTech Championship Prototype schedule.
Bob Stallings, executive chairman of GAINSCO, as well as the founder of the GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Race team, recently decided not to run his own race team in 2018, instead opting to have GAINSCO serve as a sponsor within the series.
“We had many opportunities to continue our quest for championships and JDC-Miller Motorsports was an easy pick,” said Stallings. “John Church and John Miller have established themselves as a team to be reckoned with, even against the formidable competition in IMSA.”
The Minnesota-based team made an impressive debut in the 2017 IMSA Prototype class in 2017, finishing fourth overall. They led four events and were the only LMP2 team to complete every race in 2017.
“After getting to know them both and seeing the success they have had in a short period of time and especially after watching their performance in the Mosport race last season, I knew we had found the right match. JDC-Miller has the resources, drivers, engineering experience and desire to win that I was looking for. JDC-Miller Motorsports reminds me a lot of the early days of GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing, and I am looking forward to rallying the support of our combined fan-base behind JDC-Miller Motorsports and the No. 99 Red Dragon,” said Stallings.
Led by team principal John Church, JDC-Miller Motorsports earned 18 motorsports championships since its inception in 2011. Goikhberg and Simpson will enter their third full season driving together with the JDC squad. It’s been a successful pairing thus far as the pair won the 2016 Rolex 24 At Daytona and Long Beach in the Prototype Challenge class before very transitioning to the top-tier Prototype class in 2017.
“We are very honored to gain the support of GAINSCO Auto Insurance and to carry on the livery of the No. 99 Red Dragon,” said Church. “It was immediately evident that the GAINSCO folks are as committed as we are. This is a tremendous opportunity for JDC-Miller MotorSports and we look forward to the season ahead.”
Andy Jordan, senior vice president of Marketing and Business Development for GAINSCO, led the search for the GAINSCO’s 2018 racing partnership.
“We were amazed and flattered by the amount of interest we received from teams who felt their racing programs would be elevated by an opportunity to partner with us and run the famous Red Dragon livery,” said Jordan. “There were several important considerations for GAINSCO; the team had to compete at the highest level, and it had to feel like the kind of family we could be a part of and believe in. JDC-Miller Motorsports was the team we kept coming back to. They race prototypes, they are great people, they are committed to win and the parallels between JDC-Miller Motorsports today and GAINCSO/Bob Stallings Racing in 2006/2007 were abundant. I couldn’t be prouder and more excited to join John and his team for the 2018 season and hopefully beyond.”
Source : speedsport.com
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