Newly-crowed IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GT Daytona class champion Madison Snow says the high level of competition in the series this season made the accomplishment extra special.

The second-generation driver paired with Byran Sellers in the No. 48 Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 and emerged on top in a season-long duel with Meyer Shank Racing’s Katherine Legge and the rest of the stout GTD field.

Snow said he entered the year thinking pure consistency would be enough to bring home a championship but quickly came to appreciate that excellence would be required to seal the deal.

“At the beginning of the year, me and Bryan always were joking around that if we get a third or a fourth every race we’ll have the championship,” Snow told Sportscar365.

“Then the end of the year comes and you realize how tough it really is, how close we were to getting it, and how much tougher that makes it.

“Going into this race knowing that we had to get a podium if they were to win the race, it’s good to see another strong car out there, that’s what makes it fun.

“If we didn’t have the competition as the challenge there wouldn’t be any excitement to it. That’s what makes it so good, knowing the competition that you’re up against.”

Snow said that he enjoyed being tested against some of the best drivers in GT racing in the championship-deciding race, where he, Sellers and Corey Lewis recorded a third place class finish.

“That’s what’s cool in the endurance races: you get to run with everybody,” Snow said. “In the sprint races, you’re usually going to run with the same people.

“In the endurance races, strategy changes, there’s different drivers out there, that’s what I love the most about it.

“It’s people that I, not too long ago, looked at and watched from the sidelines because I was too young to drive a car.

“Bryan was one of those. Now I’m with him and racing against the other people that I was watching, so that’s pretty special.”

Sellers, Snow’s co-driver for the past three years, heaped praise upon his young teammate while acknowledging the role he played in securing the championship.

“Proud would be an understatement,” he told Sportscar365. “He never disappoints. The kid is phenomenal and he continues to learn and get better.

“In a couple more years, people are going to be saying: this kid got to go up against the likes of Madison Snow. I rate him really highly.

“He’s a sponge in the trailer, a sponge in the car, and I think that’s what it takes. You’ve got to be willing to learn and adapt and try and think, and he’s been phenomenal this year.

“We relied on him a lot at certain points in time and he stepped up and did a great job.”

Dream Season for Lamborghini in GTD

Giorgio Sanna, Head of Lamborghini Motorsport, says 2018 has exceeded every expectation for the brand, which racked up class wins at Daytona and Sebring to go along with the GTD drivers, teams and manufacturers’ title in the extremely competitive class.

“It’s an amazing championship, really tough,” Sanna told Sportscar365. “If you think that after 12 weekends and a 10-hour race we finished with just a few points between us, it explains how difficult this championship is.

“We are really proud of the result. We thank Paul Miller Racing, the drivers, they’ve done a great job. It’s an amazing job that they have done and we are really proud of that at Squadra Corse and the entire Lamborghini brand.

“For us, it’s always a big effort. We are the youngest ones on the grid, but these results show one more time the passion, the work that we share with our customer teams, with our drivers, with our junior drivers like Madison.

“I don’t think we can expect more than this. We are really happy and now we will start tomorrow to work with the Evo for next season.”

John Dagys contributed to this report