Team Seattle debuted at the 1997 24 Hours of Daytona, supporting a Porsche fielded by Alex Job Racing. The team expanded to field two cars in the 1998 event. In 1999, their two-car effort with Alex Job Racing was enhanced by the inclusion of professional drivers Kelly Collins, Anthony Lazzaro, and Cort Wagner. One of these Team Seattle-backed Alex Job Porsches achieved a class victory.
In 2000, Team Seattle partnered with The Racer's Group, another Porsche team. The team moved to the GTS category in 2002, competing with Park Place Racing's Saleens. In 2003, Team Seattle joined forces with Essex Racing, securing a first and second-place finish in their class at Daytona in a Lola-Nissan. Essex Racing switched to Multimatic-Fords in 2004 but did not replicate their previous success in the Daytona Prototype category. Team Seattle returned to Porsches in 2005 with a two-car effort alongside Synergy Racing, and in 2006, they received corporate backing from Microsoft. A partnership with Farnbacher-Loles Racing was formed in 2008.
In 2009, Team Seattle announced a collaboration with Italian racing team AF Corse to enter the 24 Hours of Le Mans. This endeavor aimed to raise funds for both Seattle Children's and Mecenat Chirurgie Cardiaque Enfants du Monde. Initially a reserve entry, Team Seattle received a full entry on March 31, 2009, after another competitor withdrew. The team utilized a Ferrari F430 GT2 from AF Corse's Advanced Engineering division. The driving team consisted of founder Don Kitch Jr., Joe Foster, and actor Patrick Dempsey. The team innovatively allowed donors to have personal photos added to the car's paint scheme in exchange for donations, with an expectation of raising $1 million at the event.
In 2014, former Team Seattle driver Ian James founded The Heart of Racing, which partnered with Team Seattle and Alex Job Racing from 2014 until 2016. Team Seattle returned to competition in the 2020 IMSA SportsCar Championship, achieving a second-place finish at the 2020 12 Hours of Sebring. In 2021, Team Seattle secured their first win at the Detroit SportsCar Classic with drivers Roman De Angelis and Ross Gunn, capitalizing on another team's penalty. They added two more wins that season, finishing 3rd in the GTD standings.
For the 2022 IMSA SportsCar Championship, Team Seattle fielded a second car in GTD Pro, finishing 4th in the standings, while Roman De Angelis won the GTD championship. The 2023 IMSA SportsCar Championship saw the team finish 5th in GTD Pro and 2nd in GTD.
This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.
Gallery · 4 related images
