DETROIT — Five weeks after lowering the curtain on the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season with a Victory Circle celebration, Cadillac Racing continues preparations for 2026 championship runs with a two-day test at Daytona International Speedway.

In addition to eight returning Cadillac Racing drivers seeing track time in the Nos. 10 and 40 Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing V-Series.Rs and No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R, Cadillac Formula 1 Team test driver Colton Herta and American stock car racing star Connor Zilisch will take the wheel of a Cadillac Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) racecar for the first time.

Five sessions November 14-15 for GTP competitors are scheduled on the 3.56-mile, 12-turn road course, which will host the 2026 season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona in January.

Herta, 25, who will contest the upcoming FIA Formula 2 season with Hitech Racing, recently was confirmed to compete in the 2026 IMSA Daytona, Sebring and Road Atlanta endurance races in the No. 40 Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing V-Series.R.

NASCAR Xfinity Series regular-season champion and rookie of the year Zilisch will get an early look at Daytona International Speedway – where he’ll make his NASCAR Cup Series full-season debut in February in the No. 99 Chevrolet for Trackhouse Racing – by driving the No. 31 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R campaigned by Action Express Racing at the test.

“Hopefully, we’re going to make the most of it and see if this can lead to more opportunities for me in the Cadillac because it would be super cool for me to be able to race at the highest levels of endurance racing,” said Zilisch, 19, of Mooresville, North Carolina. “That’s always been a dream of mine.”

Championship weekends are supposed to be celebratory. Fun. Thrilling.

While the losing team’s fans may be upset, they can still appreciate a game well-played between competitors.

2025 Championship Weekend was a whole different vibe for NASCAR, and not in a good way.

With nonstop talk going into the weekend about the legitimacy of the one-race battle for the title, we knew the results were going to be looked at under a microscope.

To be frank, this weekend at Phoenix had a funereal feel to many fans, who saw this as the end of an era where changes that have been implemented have had unintended consequences that have hurt the sport’s integrity — and as the weekend played out, we saw two more heartbreaking examples of why this playoff format needs to end and a major reset is needed for the sport in 2026.

Friday Miracle from Heim, but disappointment for Zilisch on Saturday

To start the weekend, disaster was averted on Friday courtesy of a late 7-wide banzai move by Corey Heim that allowed him to claim a title that rightfully should have already been his. If he hadn’t won the championship due to late cautions, it would’ve been a travesty, as Heim had perhaps the most dominant season ever in the series’ history. So, we got through one day without a calamity.

But then our luck ran out.