With TDS Racing, McElrea finished second and third across 2024 and 2025 before joining United Autosports for the 2026 campaign.
After a fraught Daytona 24 in which neither United Autosports entry finished on the podium, the LMP2 came out swinging at Sebring for a one-two finish.
McElrea celebrated victory alongside Canadian Phil Fayer and Danish driver Mikkel Jensen in the #2 car, narrowly beating the sister #22 of Paul Di Resta, Dan Goldburg, and Rasmus Lindh.
It’s the first Sebring 12 Hours win for the Zak Brown and Richard Dean co-owned United Autosports team, having previously won the FIA World Endurance Championship 1000 Miles of Sebring.
“We just put ourselves in position,” McElrea said.
“Obviously it was a rough start, but we executed after that and we were hitting fuel numbers, putting ourselves in the right spot to be there at the end.
“The car was mega. I was shocked with the fuel numbers we were needing to do, how fast we were, and we were fighting for the lead.
“Pretty stoked with this one, first Sebring 12 Hours win, and it doesn’t get too much better.”
The race was won outright by Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Felipe Nasr, Julien Andlauer, and Laurin Heinrich in a Porsche 963 one-two finish.
The #7 car led the sister #6 car of Matt Campbell, Kevin Estre, and Laurens Vanthoor by 1.515s after 343 laps.
Earl Bamber, Jack Aitken, and Frederik Vesti in the #31 Action Express Racing Cadillac V-Series.R were promoted to the podium after the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing was disqualified for a technical infringement.
Scott Dixon finished fourth in the #60 Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-06 with Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun.
In GTD, Tom Sargent claimed third in the #120 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 with IndyCar star Callum Ilott and Adam Adelson from seventh on the grid.
Ilott briefly put the team into the class lead. The team’s result was nearly derailed by a drive-through penalty, though Ilott and Sargent kept the car in podium contention.
“ To be honest, it’s a little bit unreal at the moment,” Sargent said.
“Callum drove an awesome last stint, but Adam drove amazingly all day. He put in some proper times and so did Callum.
“I think we deserve this after such a disappointing outcome in Daytona, which was through no fault of our own.
“We bounced back and we didn’t make any mistakes, and it shows in our result.”
Antonio Fuoco won the class with Simon Mann and Liloux Wadoux in the #21 AF Corse Ferrari 296 after a last lap pass on Tom Gamble’s #27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin.
Gamble locked up into Turn 10 and missed the apex, allowing Fuoco to slip past and take the lead.
The win was the culmination of a storming drive from Fuoco, who on the final restart stormed through from seventh.
“I went really aggressively through turn one, overtook two or three cars on one lap,” said Fuoco.
“Then from there, I just tried to push until the end. Then on the last lap, the Aston in front made a small mistake.
“I took the chance to drive on the outside through [turn] 11 and 12, and it worked out.
“I think I will put the last stint in the top three of the GT races I’ve done so far.”
The IMSA SportsCar Championship returns at the Grand Prix of Long Beach on April 18 with GTP and GTD in action.
Discussion about this post