Congratulations to Team Cadillac, winners of the 2012 Pirelli World Challenge GT Manufacturer’s Championship. And a special congrats to Johnny O’Connell, winner of the GT-class Driver’s Championship.

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Mark Reuss, President, GM North America, statement on today’s announcement regarding the merger of GRAND-AM Road Racing and the American Le Mans Series:

“This is an exciting moment in sports car racing. This merger combines the best attributes of GRAND-AM Road Racing and the American Le Mans Series to create a singularly focused series. Congratulations to Jim France and Dr. Don Panoz on having the passion for sports car racing and the vision to take it to the next level. The joining of these two series will provide a foundation for Chevrolet to develop technologies and race cars with tremendous relevancy to the production vehicles we sell today and in the future.”

O’Connell Fulfills Goal of World Challenge Driver Title for Team Cadillac; Pilgrim Makes It 1-2 Sweep

O’Connell Consistent, Fast In Earning First Career Pirelli World Challenge Crown

• * Three Victories, 12 Top-10 Finishes Lead the Way
• * Pilgrim Smooth, Logs 11 Top-Five Finishes
• * Cadillacs Finished in top 10 in all 12 Races

SONOMA, Calif. – Johnny O’Connell is a champion racing driver, and as such, he wants to win more championships.

He did so this season, taking Team Cadillac back to the top of the podium in the Pirelli World Challenge Series GT Series on the strength of three victories, nine top-five and 12 top-10 finishes.

“This was my objective since the awards banquet last year when we finished second,” O’Connell said of his first World Challenge championship. “With a year to learn and develop, we figured we would enter this season in a good position. We didn’t make any mistakes this year, and it’s always great when you set a goal to meet it.”

After winning five championships with Corvette, O’Connell tried to put it in perspective.

“This matches those titles I won with Corvette and probably surpasses them, because this one was just me by myself, in terms of driving,” he said. “[Team director] Steve Cole has to get the credit for this, because he’s built an organization here at Cadillac that is second to none.”

After closing 2011 with two victories in the final four races, O’Connell had an inkling that 2012 could be very special for him and the team.

“When we entered last year, we had no dreams of winning it last year,” O’Connell said. “We were highly restricted and needed to do a lot of development. As the season progressed, we got to the point where were able to catch up and have a car that was good, fast and strong.

“Over the winter our engineers improved the Cadillac CTS-V Coupe and I entered this season with a lot of confidence that, provided I did some pretty simple things, I would be able to be in a position to win the championship. Those things were: don’t hit anybody, don’t break anything, stay on the race track.”

He did exactly that, finishing all 12 races in the top 10, nine in the top five.

“It sounds stupid, and it really isn’t that simple, but that’s what we did. We had a good opening round at St. Pete, Long Beach was good, but the key to winning is always being there. The only place I felt super strong was at Detroit, we had a great car at Miller and we had great cars at Mosport.”

The competition was stiff, O’Connell said, and that makes the title so much sweeter.

“The Volvo was super strong, the Porsche was strong and the Corvette had two wins at Mosport,” he said. “There were a lot of cars that were competitive. This championship was won with a combination of speed and wisdom.”

Andy Pilgrim, the only driver to have competed for Cadillac’s GT program in every race of its history, finished second to O’Connell in the driver standings with nearly an identical record. He had one victory, at Long Beach, 11 top-five and 12 top-10 finishes.

“We didn’t dominate,” Pilgrim said of the season. “It was all team. We did not have the fastest cars, we didn’t earn pole positions and it’s all about team and a car that’s reliable. They give us great cars, we do our job and we had to stay out of trouble. “

O’Connell said the Manufacturer’s crown and his driver title are just part of the overall program that Cadillac has for the future.

“If you look at the product, where the CTS-V is, they’re moving toward an athletic platform that takes on and beats BMW. The ATS is a perfect example of that. I’ve driven so many prototype cars for GM…the ATS is insane how good it is. It’s the best car I’ve ever driven as a GM vehicle. That comparison is not even close. They are truly living up to their motto of “Standard of the World,” and using racing as a platform to achieve that.

“It’s a great thing for me and for Andy Pilgrim to represent them. We’re moving forward.”

Cole, who was an engineer in the Corvette program and worked with both O’Connell and Pilgrim in the halcyon days of that program, said the drivers and crews worked so well together during the title run.

“This is truly a reliability and consistency championship, not a performance championship,” Cole said. “The credit goes to Mike West and that crew, the guys at the shop who break their backs when we get back there and cover us when we make dumb mistakes at the track. The engineers are relentless in their pursuit of performance and consistent setups. It’s a great team, we’re happy to be here and glad to have won these titles.”

Team Cadillac Seals the Deal at Sonoma, Taking Manufacturer’s Title, Top Two Spots in Driver’s

Pilgrim’s Runner-Up Finish Clinches Second in Driver Points

• * Cadillac Tops Volvo for Manufacturer’s Crown, 82-69
• * O’Connell Wins Driver Title by 149 Points
• * First Manufacturer Title Since 2005 for Team Cadillac

SONOMA, Calif. – Team Cadillac came into the Cadillac Grand Prix of Sonoma with a sack full of season awards already in the bag.

They left Sonoma with the whole thing, and it happened on the weekend of Cadillac’s 110th anniversary as a company.

Team Cadillac locked up its first Pirelli World Challenge Series Manufacturer’s Championship since 2005, Andy Pilgrim nailed down second place in the driver point standings with a stellar run in his No. 8 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe and gave the team a 1-2 sweep in the Driver’s Championship.

Pilgrim finished second to Volvo’s Alex Figge in the final GT Series race of the season, just 1.131 seconds behind, clinching a tight battle for second place in the points over Figge’s Volvo teammate, Randy Pobst, who finished third.

Cadillac won the Manufacturer’s Championship with 82 points, followed by Volvo with 69 and Porsche with 68.

Pilgrim earned second place by 62 points over Pobst, with Porsche’s Lawson Aschenbach fourth, 45 points in arrears of Pobst.

Johnny O’Connell had locked up the driver’s title at Mid-Ohio earlier in the month, and he finished 149 points ahead of Pilgrim after finishing fifth on Saturday.

“It’s something to be very proud of,” O’Connell said of his first World Challenge crown. “This is my 12th year driving for GM, the fifth championship I’ve managed to get driving for them, and to do it now in the Cadillac is exciting, because this is an amazing time in Cadillac history.”

Pilgrim was focused on keeping second place in the points, and he had to stay close to the Volvo duo to make sure it happened. Starting fourth, he battled with Aschenbach up through Turn 2 on the opening lap, managing to fend off the Porsche driver for the spot.

The Volvos, led by Figge, took off at the start and kept a slim lead on the Cadillac duo. On the sixth lap, Pilgrim got past O’Connell for third and started in on Pobst. He got him on lap 20, coming into Turn 9, and made the pass stick through Turns 10 and 11.

From there, he chased Figge to the checkered flag. O’Connell, protecting Pilgrim’s rear bumper, lost fourth place to Aschenbach on the 18th of 26 laps and finished fifth.

“I’m just so proud of the whole team and Johnny,” a happy Pilgrim said in Victory Lane. “We got Manufacturer’s, he got the driver’s championship, and if I can’t get the driver’s championship, finishing second behind him to me is like winning the championship also.”

Sonoma’s 2.385-mile, 12-turn layout is not one that favors the long-wheelbase CTS-V Coupe, but Pilgrim explained that while it’s difficult to race here, it’s a challenge he relishes.

“It’s a difficult place to drive, because you’re sliding around everywhere, you really have to pick your moments and every corner has its issues,” he said. “You just have to stay in control, and you have these controlled, lurid slides going on everywhere. So you have to stay within yourself and try to push yourself. It’s a real driver’s race track.”

For the season, O’Connell amassed three victories, nine top-five and 12 top-10 finishes. Pilgrim won once, had an amazing 11 top-five finishes and also recorded 12 top-10s.

O’Connell won at St. Petersburg to open the season, then swept the Detroit Grand Prix doubleheader. Pilgrim won at the Grand Prix of Long Beach.

“We didn’t dominate,” Pilgrim said of the season. “It was all team. We did not have the fastest cars, we didn’t get pole positions, and it’s all about team and a car that’s reliable. They give us great cars, we do our job and we had to stay out of trouble. “

Cadillac Global Marketing Director Jim Vurpillat was happy at the end of the day.

“You couldn’t ask for a better was to wrap up the season with the manufacturer’s championship,” he said. “That was the goal at the beginning of the season, and when you realize your goal, it feels good. When you have two great drivers like Johnny and Andy, they’re the class of the field and it showed.”

John Kraemer, Cadillac V-Series and Racing Marketing Manager, made the point that Cadillac is once again at the top of the heap on the track.

“When we started last year, we said Cadillac is back, and this is the exclamation point,” he said. “Cadillac is back.”

Brett Sandberg finished sixth in a Porsche, with the similar machines of Brandon Davis, Michael Hedlund and Jeff Courtney right behind. Anders Hainer rounded out the top 10 in an Audi R8.

The season-ending Cadillac Grand Prix of Sonoma will be broadcast at 3 p.m. EDT on Sept. 9 on the NBC Sports Network.

Team Cadillac Focus Is On Pilgrim, Race for 2nd in Driver’s Championship at Sonoma Finale

One More Goal to Meet in Dream Season for Team Cadillac

• * Manufacturer Title All But Clinched
• * Pilgrim Holds 53-Point Lead over Third Place

SONOMA, Calif. – Entering the final race of the Pirelli World Challenge Series on Saturday, Team Cadillac has one more bit of business to attend to.

Having already clinched the Driver’s Championship with Johnny O’Connell and in unassailable command of the Manufacturer’s Championship, the key piece of the weekend’s racing activity is to make it a 1-2 finish in the Driver’s Championship.

Andy Pilgrim holds a 53-point lead over Volvo’s Randy Pobst for second place in the driver standings, and since Pobst will start second and Pilgrim’s Cadillac CTS-V Coupe will start fourth on Saturday, it is vital to the mission to stay close.

“I really want to get second in the points, no doubt about it,” Pilgrim said. “All we can do is make sure that our stuff is as good as it can possibly be. It’s going to be very difficult. The Volvos, if they run flawlessly, they just walk away. Here, with the three slow corners and the fact that they have all-wheel-drive, it’s going to be very difficult.

“I’m going to be giving 150 percent, and we have a great race car. If I can race with them, I’m going to push as hard as I possibly can. It’s an uphill battle, but I’m going to go for it.”

O’Connell said the Volvo advantage is in the all-wheel-drive, which is suited to some of the slower corners at Speedway Sonoma.

“Our Cadillac is good on fast tracks with long, sweeping corners,” he said. “When you have tight stuff, second-gear corners, it certainly doesn’t work to our advantage because we’re a long wheelbase car. The fact that we qualified third and fourth is good, and the strength of this team is our preparation, our engineering and how we perform in the race.”

O’Connell is committed to helping Pilgrim nail down second place in the points.

“Anything we can do to help Andy in his bid for second in the driver’s standings, we’re going to do.”

The Cadillac Grand Prix of Sonoma kicks off at noon today, and will be streamed live at www.world-challengetv.com. The race will be broadcast on NBC Sports Network on Sept. 9 at 3 p.m. EDT.

At least five defense contractors with Southeast Michigan operations are vying for a $318 million contract to supply a special ops truck with weapons and off-road capability that can be deployed from military helicopters.

Engineers and designers at the Madison Heights office of Navistar Defense coordinated that company’s development of the Special Operations Tactical Vehicle, Navistar’s proposal for the pending Ground Mobility Vehicle 1.1 program under consideration at the U.S. Special Operations Command.

A business unit of Warrenville, Ill.-based Navistar International Corp. (NYSE: NAV), Navistar Defense collaborated with Science Applications International Corp. of McLean, Va., and South Carolina-based Indigen Armor on that proposal, which builds upon the design of Indigen’s own Non-Standard Tactical Truck.

“It’s a more overt version. Where the (Indigen Armor) truck is covert and designed to look more like a conventional pickup that blends in, this is more oriented to resemble a military vehicle,” said communications manager Elissa Koc of Navistar Defense. “(The military) has asked for an unarmored variant, (but) even our variant has a certain limited amount of armor.”

SOCOM, a unified military command of the U.S. Department of Defense in Tampa, Fla., coordinates clandestine operations and oversees more than 50,000 special operations personnel in the various armed services. It received business proposals in mid-June and expects to award a seven-year contract on the GMV 1.1 by January.

The contract will involve two years of integration and prototype testing followed by five years of fixed-price production. At least 1,300 new trucks are expected to be produced by 2020.

The new fleet is expected to feature several upgrades to SOCOM’s current ground mobility vehicle, which is a variant of the High Mobility Multi-purpose Wheeled Vehicle, or Humvee, developed by AM General LLC. It is also designed to allow teams of up to seven special ops soldiers to rapidly deploy from the cargo holds of Army CH-47 Chinook or Marine Corps MH-47 helicopters.

AM General, which has a military vehicle engineering and product development center in Livonia, also submitted a bid on the GMV 1.1, as did Sterling Heights-based General Dynamics Land Systems.

New Hudson-based Pratt Miller Engineering Inc. and BAE Systems Inc., which houses its Heavy Brigade Combat Team business unit in Sterling Heights, are project collaborators with Northrop Grumman Corp. on that company’s Medium Assault Vehicle – Light proposal for the GMV 1.1 program.

Oshkosh Defense, a division of Wisconsin-based Oshkosh Corp. (NYSE: OSK), an engineering center in Warren, also submitted a bid on GMV 1.1 but did not furnish details about its proposal to Crain’s.

Northrop and Navistar confirmed their proposed vehicles include a retractable mounted machine gun. Ken McGraw, deputy public affairs officer for SOCOM, said the new vehicle fleet is expected to be transportable via Chinook and have an off-road capability to “previously denied terrain” for special operations.

George Ash, partner and chairman of the regulated industries practice team at Foley & Lardner LLP in Detroit, said local defense contractors are showing increased interest in smaller-scale military projects.

A January contract decision date, Ash said, could be a sign that a vehicle program remains subject to $110 billion in automatic federal spending cuts that kick in Jan. 2 unless Congress works out other means of reducing the federal budget. But McGraw said the award date is not related to sequestration.

“If you have a contract in place, and you have budget money obligated on the contract, you’re probably in good shape if sequestration happens,” Ash said.

“But to the extent you have an award coming after the November-December timeframe, the program could be more tenuous. Congress may not address this issue until after the Nov. 7 election, and there’s certainly a lack of clarity on which direction the budget will take.”