MONTEREY, Calif. — Cadillac paced the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) field throughout practice for the feature race of the StubHub Monterey SportsCar Championship weekend, and Louis Deletraz and Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing maintained that advantage Saturday in qualifying.
Deletraz secured the Motul Pole Award at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca for Round 4 of the 2026 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season by lapping the classic California road course in 1 minute, 13.221 seconds (110.033 miles per hour) in Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing’s No. 40 Cadillac V-Series.R.
Jack Aitken completed a front row sweep for Cadillac by running second in Cadillac Whelen’s similar No. 31 V-Series.R, lapping in 1:13.501 (109.614 mph).
The Cadillacs were conspicuously strong in three hours of practice spread over two days, and Deletraz was able to show similar speed in qualifying in the car he shares with Jordan Taylor. It was the Swiss driver’s third WeatherTech Championship pole and first in nearly two years (Watkins Glen International, 2024).
The top seven qualifiers were within 0.855 seconds and four manufacturers (Cadillac, Acura, BMW, and Aston Martin) were represented in the top six.
Nick Yelloly was third fastest in the No. 93 Acura Meyer Shank Racing w/Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06 at 1:13.696 (109.324 mph), followed by Dries Vanthoor in the No. 24 BMW M Team WRT BMW M Hybrid V8 with a time of 1:13.735. Their respective co-drivers are Renger van der Zande and Sheldon van der Linde.
Deletraz is a former race winner at WeatherTech Raceway, triumphing in 2022 in the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) class for Tower Motorsports.
“Obviously it’s awesome to get the Motul Pole Award, especially at a track like this where overtaking is really hard,” Deletraz commented. “A big thank you to Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing, because I feel we have really improved a lot in the last six months. The car has been consistently strong, and I think today was a good reward for everyone, putting it on pole. I’m really excited for the race tomorrow.”
Laguna Seca is notorious for high tire degradation, but Deletraz remained confident that the Cadillacs can maintain their single-lap superiority over full stints throughout the two-hour, 40-minute race.
“We started really strong in free practice and had really strong one-lap pace, but there’s always some pressure for qualifying because you don’t know what others are hiding,” he said. “The race pace is also strong, I think – not much stronger than everyone else, but we’re up there in the top three, I’d say. I’m pretty sure we can stay up there and fight for the win. We just have to execute tomorrow and do a good race with no mistakes. Hopefully we can be up on the top step of the podium at the end.”
It’s been a fairly lengthy dry spell for Wayne Taylor Racing, which has not visited the top step at victory lane since resuming its manufacturer partnership with Cadillac in 2025. WTR’s last WeatherTech Championship race win in GTP came at Detroit in June 2024 when it was working with Acura.
“Everyone saw last year that we had to learn,” Deletraz said. “The Cadillac was a new car for us and we definitely struggled. Since the start of this year we’ve been a bit unlucky, but I think if you ask all four drivers at Wayne Taylor Racing (Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque share the No. 10 Cadillac V-Series.R, which qualified seventh for Sunday’s race), we’re all enjoying a lot more the driving. We’re very happy with the car, so this is a great reward, where we are now. We all want to be first, so to be here means we’ve done something right.”
