Kathy Rude (born 1957) is an American sports car driver who was one of the first female drivers to attract international attention. Growing up in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, she began competing as a teenager in karting events. By her early 20s, after competing in Formula Ford and IMSA, she attracted the attention of several top-tier car owners. She was a member of the Mazda and the original North American Toyota factory-sponsored IMSA GT Championship teams. In February 1982, co-driving a factory-sponsored Mazda RX-7 with Allan Moffat and Lee Mueller, she earned a GTU class victory at the 24 Hours of Daytona. During an IMSA sports car event at Brainerd, Minnesota in July 1983, she suffered horrific injuries in a crash which ended her racing career. Noted sports car champion Brian Redman once referred to her as the only female driver he'd encountered who posed a genuine threat to win major professional automobile races. She is now a corporate safe driving instructor and speaker.
From 1987 to 1994 she led safe driving and new car intros for Audi of America, Inc., driver clinics for Boeing employees through the Boeing Employees Automobile Club and did the initial instructor training for the then-new Audi Quattro Club.
Kathy is also a breast cancer survivor including a stem cell transplant, trial drugs and radiation. Now doing well, she is married (since 1985) to Canadian sports-car racer and three-time Indianapolis 500 veteran Ludwig Heimrath, Jr. living in western Washington State.
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The 24 Hours of Daytona, also known as the Rolex 24 At Daytona for sponsorship reasons, is a 24-hour sports car endurance race held annually at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida. It is run on the Sports Car Course layout, a 3.56-mile (5.73 km) combined road course that uses most of the tri-oval plus an infield road course. Held on the last weekend of January or first weekend of February as part of Speedweeks, it is the first major automobile race of the year in North America. The race is sanctioned by IMSA and is the first race of the season for the IMSA SportsCar Championship.
The International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) is a North American sports car racing sanctioning body based in Daytona Beach, Florida under the jurisdiction of the ACCUS arm of the FIA. It was started by John Bishop, a former executive director of SCCA, and his wife Peggy in 1969 with help from Bill France Sr. of NASCAR. Beginning in 2014, IMSA is the sanctioning body of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, the premier series resulting from the merger of Grand-Am Road Racing and the American Le Mans Series. IMSA is owned by NASCAR, as a division of the company.
The Atlantic Championship is a formula race car series with races throughout North America. It has been called Champ Car Atlantics, Toyota Atlantics, or just Atlantics or Formula Atlantic, although the latter two terms risk confusion with the Sports Car Club of America's amateur Formula Atlantics division.
Ludwig Heimrath Jr. is a Canadian businessman and former race car driver in open-wheel and sports-car racing.
Joest Racing is a sports car racing team that was established in 1978 by former Porsche works racer Reinhold Joest. Their headquarters are in Wald-Michelbach, Germany.
Dyson Racing is a professional sports car racing team based in Poughkeepsie, New York in the United States. Founded by Rob Dyson in 1974, the team competed successfully in North American sports car racing series, including the IMSA GT Championship and American Le Mans Series.
IMSA GT was a sports car racing series organized by International Motor Sports Association. Races took place primarily in the United States and occasionally in Canada.
Yojiro Terada is a Japanese racing driver from Kobe, Hyogo Prefecture. He is known for holding the record for the second most participations in the 24 Hours of Le Mans without an overall win, having run on 29 occasions since 1974. He is also third behind Henri Pescarolo and Bob Wollek for the drivers with the most participations. He scored class victories at the event in 1983, 1988, 1990 and 1996, while his best overall finish was seventh in 1995.
Laurens Vanthoor is a Belgian professional racing driver currently racing for Porsche Motorsport as a factory driver in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. He currently resides in Waiblingen outside of Stuttgart.
Tristan Vautier is a French professional racing driver who is currently competing in the 2023 FIA World Endurance Championship for the Vanwall Racing Team.
Bryce Miller is an American racing driver from Summit, New Jersey. He currently drives in the IMSA owned Tudor United SportsCar Championship for Paul Miller Racing. Bryce is the son of Paul Miller and nephew of Kenper Miller, both of whom competed in sports car racing. The family trio aggregates a consolidated 75 years of motor racing experience.
Dane Cameron is an American racing driver from Glen Ellen, California. He won the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship overall in 2016 and 2019, and also in the GTD class in 2014.
Devin Jones is an American professional stock car and sports car racing driver. He currently competed full-time in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, driving the No. 82 BMW M4 GT4 for BimmerWorld Racing and part-time in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, driving the No. 74 Chevrolet Camaro for CHK Racing.
Dion von Moltke is an American-born race car driver who has participated under a South African racing license for the majority of his career. Von Moltke currently competes in the IMSA WeatherTech Championship GTD class with Paul Miller Racing in the #48 Audi R8 LMS with co-driver Christopher Haase. His early career involved an upbringing in karts and the Skip Barber National Championship.
Tristan Nunez is an American racing driver from in Boca Raton, Florida. He is the son of Juan Nunez, a former professional tennis player and coach. Nunez has a fraternal twin brother, Dylan, who was a globally ranked junior tennis player, and is now an aspiring actor.
Paul Fix II is an American racecar driver based in Williamsville, New York, United States. He has been competing in the SCCA Professional Trans-Am Series since 2000.
Scott Hargrove is a Canadian racing driver from Vancouver, British Columbia.
Parker Thompson is a Canadian race car driver from Red Deer, Alberta, Canada.
Ashley Lynn Freiberg is an American racing driver who has competed in open-wheel, sports car and endurance racing. She became the first woman to win a Skip Barber Racing championship title in 2010, and the first female to claim outright race victories in the IMSA GT3 Cup Challenge and the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge in 2013 and 2014, respectively.
JDC–Miller MotorSports is a sports car racing team that currently competes in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. The team currently fields the No. 5 Porsche 963 full-time for Tijmen van der Helm and Mike Rockenfeller in the GTP class of the IMSA SportsCar Championship. JDC previously ran the No. 17 Unitronic/Liqui Moly Audi RS3 LMS TCR SEQ full-time for Chris Miller and Zikey Taylor in the Touring Car class in 2022.