Cadillac DPi-V.R Race Car Brings Caddy Back To Prototype Racing

Cadillac has been out of the endurance prototype racing game for over a decade, but that will all change during the 2017 IMSA season opener held on January 28-29 2017. That event is the Rolex 24 at Daytona and teams form Wayne Taylor Racing and Action express Racing will be fielding a new Cadillac racecar called the 2017 Cadillac DPi-V.R. The racers will be fielded in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar championship series.

"Cadillac is proud to return to the pinnacle of prototype racing in North America after a 14-year absence," said Johan de Nysschen, president of Cadillac. "Cadillac's V-Performance production models — the ATS-V and CTS-V — are transforming our brand's product substance, earning a place among the world's elite high performance marques. The Cadillac DPi-V.R further strengthens our V-Performance portfolio, placing Cadillac into the highest series of sports car racing in North America."

The DPi-V.R race car is designed with elements taken from the current line of Cadillac V-Performance cars, particularly the CTS-V performance sedan. Caddy spent lot of time in the wind tunnel and in engineering development to ensure the racecar was ready to win. Elements from production cars on the racer include the vertical lighting structure, body styling, and the car gets V-Performance wheels with Brembo brakes.

Power for the prototype racer comes from a normally aspirated Cadillac 6.2L V8 engine sharing an architecture with the engine from the 3rd generation CTS-V, in that streetcar it makes 640 hp with a supercharger. In the racer the engine makes 600hp when tuned to IMSA racing standards. The maximum allowable RPM is 7,600 and the chassis of the racer is made by Dallara. Packing all that power into a car weighing only 2,050 pounds will make for impressive performance.

SOURCE: Cadillac