International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) president Scott Atherton confirmed that the race was part of the 2014 United SportsCar Championship schedule in October 2013.[1] It was the first year the event was held as part of the Tudor United SportsCar Championship. The 2014 Oak Tree Grand Prix was the eleventh of thirteen scheduled sports car races of 2014 by IMSA, and it was the eighth round not held as part of the North American Endurance Cup.[1] The events were held at the seventeen-turn 3.270 mi (5.263 km) Virginia International Raceway in Alton, Virginia on August 24, 2014.[1] Due to the field size, IMSA would use a doubleheader race format where the Prototype Challenge and Cooper Tires Prototype Lites would participate in the first event in a two-segment race format while the GTLM and GTD classes would participate in the second event.[1][2]
Thirty-six cars were officially entered for the Oak Tree Grand Prix, with most of the entries being in the Grand Touring Le Mans (GTLM) and Grand Touring Daytona (GTD) classes.[4] The Prototype Challenge (PC) class was composed of nine Oreca FLM09 cars: two from Starworks Motorsport and RSR Racing. CORE Autosport, JDC-Miller MotorSports, Performance Tech, PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports, and 8Star Motorsports entered one car each.[5] Despite being listed an entry, the No. 88 BAR1 Motorsports car withdrew from the event.[6] GTLM was represented by ten entries from five different brands.[4] In the list of GTD entrants, seventeen GT-specification vehicles were represented by six different manufacturers.[7][8]
Practice
There were five practice sessions preceding the start of the races on Friday, four on Friday and one on Saturday. The first session on Friday morning lasted 60 minutes while the second on Friday afternoon ran for 30 minutes. The third scheduled for later that afternoon ran for 45 minutes while the fourth session scheduled later that afternoon lasted an hour. The fifth session on Saturday morning lasted 90 minutes.[9]
Qualifying
The first session of the week occurred on Saturday morning in the first of two sessions to set the starting order for the first race with the fastest lap times set by each team's quickest driver. Cars in Cooper Tires Prototype Lites were sent out first before those grouped in PC had one separate identically timed 15 minute session.[9]
The second session occurred on Saturday afternoon to set the starting order for the second race. Cars in GTD were sent out first before those grouped in GTLM in a separate identically 15 minute timed session. Regulations stipulated teams to nominate one qualifying driver, with the fastest laps determining each classes starting order. IMSA would arrange the grid to put all GTLM vehicles ahead of GTD cars.[9]
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