IMSA Bundle

Pre-order our hot off the press book, IMSA 1990-1999 and put the predecessor, IMSA 1969-1989, under the tree!

The entire history of IMSA is told in this great two-volume set. The original book about IMSA ships out now, and the follow-up book will be shipped to you when it arrives in January 2025! Don't miss this great chance to dive deep into the series that made the Daytona 24 Hours a legend! 

IMSA 1969-1989

The Inside Story of How John Bishop Built the World’s Greatest Sports Car Racing Series

By Mark Raffauf and Mitch Bishop, 384 pages

"You don't get much more authoritative a book on IMSA than one by the son of its founder and the organization's senior director of race operations (and former president)." —Joe Dunn, Editor, Motorsport Magazine

Fifty years ago, a new sanctioning body emerged at a pivotal moment in motorsports history. Racing was on the upswing. New tracks were being built all across the U.S., imported cars from Europe and Japan were flooding the market, designers were pushing limits and drivers were looking for an opportunity to race for more than just a trophy. Into this void stepped John Bishop with a fledgling organization called IMSA that offered competitive, professional racing in a friendly atmosphere and carried a new message: Racing with a Difference.
 
In this behind the scenes book, Mitch Bishop and Mark Raffauf tell the inside story of how IMSA became a global powerhouse in just a few short years. It covers John Bishop’s early life, his years at the SCCA and tells the story of how IMSA grew from humble beginnings in 1969 into the Camel GT Series, a circuit that became the most popular form of professional sports car racing in the world. Interviews with many of the top drivers, team owners, car builders and others from the era helped shape this book, which also includes hundreds of never-before-published photos. 
 
The first twenty years of IMSA’s history deliver fascinating stories of vision, innovation, common sense leadership and overcoming personal tragedy. Bishop and IMSA left an enormous imprint on the racing world and changed thousands of lives. This book is a must-read, for those interested in how it all happened and in learning critical management lessons still applicable in today’s motor racing world.

"It’s the deep dive IMSA has needed in book form, and even the unsavory bits — the narco years — are covered." –Marshall Pruett, RACER

"With so much domestic race history packed within, you'll be hard-pressed to put it down." —Matthew Litwin, Hemmings Muscle Machines

IMSA 1990-1999

The Turbulent Years of American Sports Car Racing

By Mark Raffauf, Martin Raffauf, and George Silbermann, 256 pages

The International Motorsports Association (IMSA), developed from nothing into the biggest and most successful sports car racing sanctioning authority in the world in just under twenty years. Documented first in IMSA 1969–1989: The Inside Story of How John Bishop Built the World’s Greatest Sports Car Racing Series, this new volume covers the turbulent 1990s and all that changed in that time.

IMSA 1990–1999: The Turbulent Years of American Sports Car Racing covers the next decade of constant change in ownership, sponsorship, racing car design, and virtually everything else that was envisioned and created by founder John Bishop. Despite the turmoil and ownership changes, the organization flourished, brought in new corporate sponsorships, created an entirely new category of top-tier prototype sports cars that eventually became accepted worldwide, and most importantly survived, though in a completely different configuration from what it once was. So strong were its integrity and strength of staff that initially, despite what many in the industry thought, the organization grew and created value to many as it went through four different ownership and management changes in six years.

Throughout all that, IMSA racing remained influential and strong, competition was good, and opportunity was high for numerous brands, companies, and competitors to showcase their products and abilities on a world motorsports stage.

The authors and main contributors, Mark Raffauf, Martin Raffauf, and George Silbermann share their personal experiences and comments from being there through all of it, along with the experiences of many individuals with different perspectives who also made their way through it all.

This is the behind-the-scenes story of all that happened in the decade of change that sowed the seeds for two diversely different organizations, both of which would carry the IMSA legacy into the next century.