How Robert Wickens’s Corvette GT3 car has been modified for IMSA return

Robert Wickens is ramping up preparations for his part campaign in the GTD class of the IMSA SportsCar Championship this year.

Wickens will share DXDT’s Corvette Z06 GT3.R with factory driver Tommy Milner in the five sprints round on IMSA’s 2025 calendar, starting with the Grand Prix of Long Beach on 12 April.

The Canadian got behind the wheel of Corvette’s GT3 contender for the first time this week during a two-day test at Sebring, an outing that made him feel “like a kid of Christmas”.

The car has been equipped with Bosch’s state-of-the-art hand-control braking system for Wickens, who was paralysed from the waist down in a violent IndyCar crash at Pocono in 2018.

Wickens already raced with the new version of the system on his Hyundai TCR car in the final two rounds of the 2024 IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, but it has been modified further for the Corvette.

Changes were made to incorporate traction control and the brake-by-wire system, and Wickens immediately felt that he felt more comfortable in the car during braking.

“The biggest takeaway I have so far is that it feels like the Bosch EBS [electronic braking system] and the hand-control system developed by Pratt Miller belongs in his car,” he said.

"There hasn’t been a single hiccup. It’s like when they designed the Corvette Z06 GT3.R it was always in the plan. It looks like it belongs in the car. It feels like it belongs in the car.

“Immediately I felt way more comfortable with the braking feeling and braking sensation than I had in my past racing in TCR with the Bosch EBS.”

Wickens also completed a short run in Formula E’s Gen3 car at Portland last year in what was his first appearance in a single-seater since his IndyCar career was cut short by the Pocono accident.

However, in contrast to the Formula E machine, the EBS worked so well on the Corvette that Wickens felt like the car was specially designed with hand controls in mind.

“Quite a bit different. The Formula E car was pretty much a temporary hand-control solution where we repurposed the re-gen paddles at the bottom of the steering wheel so one side was for throttle and one side was for braking,” he explained. “It worked but it wasn’t effective.

"Here, everyone put their heads together and we have a very well-integrated hand-control system where the paddles and everything.

“The sensation and feeling that I have, whenever I embarked on this journey to race with hand controls, I was always envisioning that hydraulic sensation with my hands when I’m applying the brake. Everyone involved made it happen.”

Before the Sebring test, Wickens developed an understanding of a hand-operated Corvette GT3 car in a simulator at his home.

“After driving this Corvette Z06, I feel like the next step for me is actually to start doing more throttle application with my right hand just to build that muscle memory,” he said.

“Because for people that don't know, I pretty much do like 98 per cent of my throttle application with my left hand. So that way I can freely upshift with my right hand and then brake with my right hand and downshift with the left hand.

“So with this car, like with Turn 7 at Sebring, there's a few corners here where I feel like I need to start practicing using throttle with both hands a little bit more.”

The IMSA SportsCar Championship marks the next stage in the career of Wickens, who was crowned the TCR class champion in the 2023 Michelin Pilot Challenge. He stayed in the same series last year.

But apart from switching championships, Wickens is also having to learn the new Corvette Z06, which is more powerful and sophisticated than the Hyundai Elantra N TCR he raced with Bryan Herta Autosport teammate Harry Gottsacker in 2023-'24'.

“I'm also still trying to learn what the car likes and how the car likes to be driven,” he explained. “When I did this in the TCR car, I had driven the TCR car for two years so I knew how to drive it and how to get the lap time out so it was just solely trying to get the brake feel to what I wanted.

“Now it's kind of a much more foggy experience because I feel like I'm learning both at the same time. We only have basically a day-and-a-half and we're on to the launch.”

Wickens’ teammate Milner shook down the hand-operated Corvette for the first time last month to ensure everything was working according to plan.

During the season, Milner himself will be using the usual pedal controls on his car, but he provided a detailed explanation of the hand control system designed for Wickens.

“In Robbie’s case, he has to do all of his driving with his hands, with him being paralysed from the chest down. So he has no use of his feet,” the American explained.

“So this system is basically set up so that he can do all that with the steering wheel itself. There's a brake ring and there are throttle paddles that take the place of what I would normally use in the pedal box.

“Those are some of the common questions that I've heard about this system when I've told people who know a little bit about racing but not this situation.

“The system is quite impressive with how it functions and how it works. With just one push of a button, the system switches from the able-bodied driver controls to the hand controls, which obviously is important for sports car racing where we have driver changes.

“But fundamentally, everything happens on the wheel. And it's a system that took me initially a little while to sort of understand in my own brain, how it is supposed to work, how to find lap time out of it and things like that.

“But the system is set up quite well to where by the end of the second day of testing that I had in the car to prove the system a bit, I was able to find quite a bit of lap time and get closer to what I was capable of with the normal able-bodied setup.

“So for someone like Robbie, who has as much racing experience as he does, as good as he was and still is, you can tell just from talking to him how focused he is on doing what he's always done, which is drive race cars very fast.

“The system is designed to allow that to happen for him. His drive and determination are pretty incredible. It's pretty inspiring to see that and I’m excited to go racing with him at Long Beach.”