BUTCH LEITZINGER

By H.A. Branham

Fifty victories. That’s our lead and we’re sticking to it, figuring it’s the best way, up front, to show why Robert Franklin “Butch” Leitzinger of State College, Pennsylvania is a 2026 inductee into the IMSA Hall of Fame. And yes, he’s a Penn State graduate. Go Nittany Lions. Go Leitzinger.

Several months after being announced in the spring as a 2026 IMSA Hall of Fame inductee, he still seemed overwhelmed. No summertime blues, yet a disarming humbleness about his achievements -- much less the HOF.

“It was a shock, it was like I was wondering if it actually happened,” Leitzinger said. "Growing up and being such a fan and seeing the people that are [already] in there ... there’s a little bit of imposter syndrome going on.”

The real deal: Only three drivers are ahead of Leitzinger on the IMSA all-time victory list (Bill Auberlen, Scott Pruett, Lucas Luhr). He’s also in that select group of drivers with victories in the IMSA GT Series, the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series and the American Le Mans Series, three layers of sports car history. Perhaps no other sports car driver can boast such crossover success, except for fellow 2026 IMSA HOF inductee Bill Auberlen. In both dudes’ cases, some core fans were missing the point if they wanted allegiance to one sanctioning body over another.

“That was just a function of having the love of racing,” Leitzinger said. “And we were sports car racers … we all had to make a living.”

Leitzinger’s 50 IMSA victories occurred between 1986-2013. Most of those 50 facilitated four IMSA championships:

• 1993 IMSA GTU Class, driving Nissan 240-SXs and beating his father Bob Leitzinger by 36 points in the final standings.
• 1997 and ’98 IMSA Pro World Sports Car Championship, driving for Dyson Racing
• 1999 United States Road Racing Championship (USRRC), shared with co-driver Elliott Forbes-Robinson

Remember all the emphasis in 2014 that the merger would indeed be just that, honoring both sides of the aisle?

This induction does just that.

Checkout, first, the longevity … and then the crossover:

Leitzinger, who followed his father Bob into IMSA competition, is mainly known for his Dyson Racing starts over two decades, facilitated by a partnership between the two teams at the top-tier prototype level on both sides of the sports cars split -- wherever the races were scheduled. Butch’s ALMS days were follow-up to an already accomplished career.

Leitzinger co-drove to three Rolex 24 At Daytona victories, in 1994 and ’97 under the “old” IMSA sanctioning and then in ’99 running the Can-Am class when the SCCA actually held the event. And how about 1994, by the way? It was epic, as a production-based car won, a Nissan 300ZX that Leitzinger shared with some kid named Scott Pruett, Paul Gentilozzi and Steve Millen.

The Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring was a blast-from-the-past playground for Leitzinger, with two class victories and six podiums at the storied, still-challenging course. The victories: GTO in 1990, co-driving a Nissan 240SX with Bob Loring and Chuck Kurtz; and GTC in 2010, teamed with Leh Keen and Juan Gonzalez in a Porsche 911 GT3. A Leitzinger/Sebring “footnote” which could easily be a headline: the 1990 victory started a run of three consecutive GTU victories for Nissan/ Leitzinger Racing cars at the old Sebring Air Terminal for Leitzinger Racing. Backing up 1990: Bob Loring and Bob Leitzinger in ’91; it was Loring and John Paul Jr. in ’92.

From Sebring historian extraordinaire Ken Breslauer: “The Leitzinger team was very successful as the Nissan factory GTU team, but their success was overshadowed by the GTP success, so I don't think they got enough credit for what they accomplished [at the lower class]. Leitzinger cars were always very well-prepared and competitive.” 

And yes, for Leitzinger, there is of course the requisite 24 Hours of Le Mans record; no ordinary outlier by any measure, but even more relative given the reimagined IMSA and its closer-than-ever ties to the endurance classic and its sanctioning body, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO). That relationship got real during the ALMS days with series founder Don Panoz at the helm, striving to build a bridge between France (The country, not Jim.) and Braselton, Georgia. Which he did, by the way. (On both items, come to think about it.)

Leitzinger raced Le Mans six times -- 1997, ’99 and 2000-03 -- driving Panoz, Cadillac and Bentley prototypes, then a Ferrari 360 in the GT class, in his final run there. In 2001-02, co-driving a Bentley EXP Speed 8 with Andy Wallace and Eric van de Poele they went back-to-back in the LMGTP class.

Another indicator of Leitzinger’s all-around talent was his being tabbed nine times to race in NASCAR, as a proverbial “road-course ringer.” This was one of the weirdest trends in NASCAR for several decades, because the ringers seldom succeeded but were often close -- and invariably exciting, via racing or wrecking. But that didn’t stop teams from the one-off hires of racers like our man Butch, who utilized his IMSA expertise and won four NASCAR Busch North Series (now known as the ARCA Menards East Series) races, three at Lime Rock Park and one at Watkins Glen International. It almost wasn’t fair. Ring.

Leitzinger almost won a Busch Grand National (now O’Reilly Auto Parts Series) race, finishing second behind another ringer, Ron Fellows, at the Glen in 2000. Hey, he led 13 laps. Another effort in production-based door-to-door sports cars, the 2000 Trans-Am Series, resulted in a rookie-of-the-year award.

The IMSA Hall of Fame honor is a full-circle experience for Leitzinger, who has ridden the roller coaster of sports car relevance. From the Camel GT days -- “It was pretty amazing, all the [legendary] guys in the paddock and the cars were beasts.” -- to the reimagined IMSA post-merger.

“I am so happy for all the success IMSA is having now,” Leitzinger said.