Madison Snow will not defend the new IMSA GT Daytona championship he earned with co-driver Bryan Sellers at Paul Miller Racing. The young Utah native, who formed a powerful pairing with Sellers in the No. 48 Lamborghini Huracan GT3, has chosen to step away from the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship series after being upgraded to professional status by IMSA in the Pro-Am GTD class.

With Sellers already serving as the long-established Pro in the program, it left Snow (pictured at right, above, with Sellers) and PMR in an untenable situation with a Pro-Pro pairing which, per its rules, is not allowed in GTD.

An appeal to maintain Snow’s amateur status was denied by IMSA, thereby forcing PMR to either part ways with Sellers or Snow, or move the team to a different series where the title winners could remain intact.

Although a decision on where PMR will race — or whether it will continue racing altogether — has not been announced, Snow chose to halt his participation in the WeatherTech Championship as a result of the driver ranking change.

“I had a great three years racing with Paul Miller Racing and Bryan Sellers, especially now that we all share a championship together,” said Snow. “Racing has become as much about politics as the team and drivers getting the car to the finish line every weekend.

“After a lot of broken promises and false hopes on the path to next year, when it became final that Bryan and I wouldn’t be able to defend our championship together due to my upgrade in IMSA driver rankings, I finalized my decision that I didn’t want to continue in IMSA. I want to thank Paul and the team for everything they’ve done, and I wish them the best for 2019 and beyond.”

Further complicating matters, Snow is known to bring a decent portion of the budget to PMR, making any search for his replacement — with so few amateur drivers possessing equal measures of speed and corporate backing — among Pro-Am racing’s most difficult pursuits.

“It’s a shame Madison won’t be with us to defend his and Bryan’s championship,” said Miller, whose team earned top 5s in 61 percent of the races Snow and Sellers drove together. “Madison is a major talent, and it has been amazing to watch him develop these last few seasons. He’s a great team member and we will miss him, but we understand and respect his decision.”