WEC

The Bus Stop chicane at Daytona is now the Le Mans Chicane, while the first chicane on the Mulsanne Straight at Le Mans is now the Daytona Chicane.

Cadillac Racing has announced it will develop a next-generation prototype race car based on the new Le Mans-Daytona Hybrid regulations, enabling the American luxury brand to race in the top class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans from 2023 onward. “Cadillac today announced it will compete in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) LMDh category in 2023 with a fourth-generation Cadillac V-Series prototype,” the automaker said in a prepared statement. “Cadillac and its partners will bring their considerable experience from American endurance racing to compete for overall victory in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.” The automaker published a design rendering for its future prototype racer on Tuesday, which it has dubbed the Cadillac LMDh-V.R.The rendering shows a Le Mans prototype with various Cadillac design cues, including sharply creased bodywork and vertically integrated LED taillights. Interestingly, the car is pictured with no rear wing – similar to the Peugeot 9X8 Hypercar that will debut in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) in 2022. Like the current Cadillac DPi-V.R prototype, the LMDh-V.R will utilize a chassis from Italian supplier Dallara. Cars that fall under LMDh regulations must also use a spec hybrid powertrain system, although manufacturers are free to use an engine of their choosing. Cadillac is keeping critical powertrain details under wraps for now and has only said the car “will feature a unique combustion engine.” In addition to bringing the car to Le Mans, Cadillac will also field the LMDh-V.R in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. It will make its competition debut at the 2023 24 Hours of Daytona before appearing at Le Mans later that year. The car will be fielded by current Cadillac DPi-V.R teams Chip Ganassi Racing and Action Express Racing in both IMSA and the FIA WEC. “We are looking forward to the new international prototype formula and running the Cadillac LMDh,” Chip Ganassi said in a prepared statement. “We have had a great relationship across three different racing disciplines with GM and we are looking forward to developing the car with Cadillac and Dallara over the next year-and-a-half.” The American manufacturer will face stiff competition in both IMSA and WEC. Toyota, Renault/Alpine and boutique manufacturer Glickenhaus already race in the newly established Hypercar class and will be joined by Peugeot, Porsche, Ferrari, Audi, BMW, Acura and WEC mainstay ByKolles over the course of the next two years. Cadillac last competed for top honors at Le Mans in 2003 with the ill-fated Northstar LMP. The Northstar LMP’s best result at Le Mans came in 2002, when the No. 6 entry finished ninth overall in the hands of Wayne Taylor, Max Angelelli and Christophe Tinseau.

Toyota are Le Mans 24 Hours winners again but it’s a first success for Mike Conway, Jose Maria Lopez and Kamui Kobayashi; Team WRT win LMP2 but are denied 1-2 Kamui Kobayashi, Mike Conway and Jose Maria Lopez can finally call themselves winners of the Le Mans 24 Hours for the first time after completing a peerless performance for Toyota to dominate from the first corner to the chequered flag 24 hours later on lap 371. A fourth consecutive win for Toyota Gazoo Racing, while the first hat-trick were all achieved by the sister #8 car, on this occasion it was the turn of the #7 trio, who after years of desperately bad luck – particularly in 2016 when the car famously stopped in the final minutes – redemption would finally come in fine style. Indeed, at no point was the entry ever headed, having qualified on pole position, led into Turn 1 and simply clicked off the laps over the next 24 hours. In all, the trio completed 371, 17 less than in 2020 with the faster LMP1 cars. The victory – a first for all three drivers after several podiums – marks the first in the Hypercar era with Toyota making the most of the thin competition to never look like it needed to chase the limit. Indeed, the #7 GR010 Hybrid extended its lead metronomically over the course of the race and suffered with nothing more than the odd electrrical gremlin. Similarly, the #8 car ran reliably throughout but saw its victory hopes ultimately dashed just seconds into the race when it was spun around by a Glickenhaus. Putting the trio of Sebastien Buemi, Kazuki Nakajima and Brendon Hartley on an immediate back foot, the car quickly made it back up to second place but never looked like a threat before Toyota put them under team orders towards the end. As such, the fight for third place proved the more engaging tussle with Alpine eventually prevailing against a feisty Glickenhaus, which arguably exceeded its own expectations with a reliable and momentum-building performance. In the end though Alpine – which had hoped to challenge Toyota only to blot its copybook with two costly spins – will be satisfied to have brought the ageing A480 home on the podium ahead of a complete overhaul for 2022. With the second Glickenhaus battling its way up from earlier dramas to eventually grab fifth, it meant all five Hypercar class cars filled the top positions. In LMP2, Team WRT suffered a shocking bittersweet tale of joy and woe as it secured victory on its debut but not with the entry it expected to after the #41 car of Robert Kubica, Louis Deletraz and Ye Yifei sensationally stopped at the start of its final revolution. The car had spent almost 19 hours out front of the class – occasionally trading with the sister #31 car – but couldn’t complete what would have been a 1-2 for the Belgian team, which has this year stepped up from GT racing to LMP2. Nonetheless, it was still able to celebrate a win with the fortuitous car belonging to Ferdinand Habsburg, Charles Milesi and Robin Frijns snatching the victory at the deathj. WRT’s misfortune meant every LMP2 runner moved up an unexpected spot, with the #28 Jota of Sean Gelael, Stoffel Vandoorne and Tom Blomqvist completing what had been a methodical rise up the order after spinning in rain early on. They spared the blushes of the British team after the hot favourites of Antonio Felix da Costa, Anthony Davidson and Roberto Gonzalez in the sister car crashed early on and never recovered. Another debutant impressing first time out was Panis Racing, who landed the final podium spot for Will Stevens, James Allen and Julien Canal. United Autosports ended the race a positive fourth, albeit still smarting from a bizarre incident that saw its other two cars collide at Turn 1 and effectively put each out of the race. Interpol Competition celebrated its best Le Mans result yet with fifth in class, thanks mostly to the efforts of Alex Brundle who was regularly one of the fastest drivers on the track. Elsewhere, the all-female Richard Mille Racing team suffered a bizarre exit when Sophia Floersch was first caught up in an accident when a G-Drive spun into her path, only to then be T-boned by a Eurasia India driver seemingly not paying attention in the slow zone. Indeed, nearly every LMP2 car endured time off circuit over the course of the race, the legacy of intermittent showers throughout the evening and into the night. In GTE Pro and GTE Am, Ferrari were a double winner in both the GTE class with AF Corse completing victory after holding down the lead for more than half of the entire race. Initially it seemed the spoils would go to the #52 488 GTE of Sam Bird, Miguel Molina and Daniel Serra before technical issues plummeted it down the order. Nevertheless, the #51 car driven by James Calado, Alessandro Pier Guidi and Come Ledogar would take over at the front and complete a satisfying win in a competitive class that never saw the Corvette Racing car fall more than a lap behind in second. Pre-race favourites Porsche had to make do with third and fourth with its factory cars, but the pole sitting Hub Auto Porsche was forced to retire. GTE AM went down to the wire before the AF Corse Ferrari trio of Francois Perrodo, Alessio Rovera and Niklas Nielsen emerged on top, ahead of the TF Sport Aston Martin driven by Ben Barker, Dylan Pereira and Ben Keating. 2021 LE MANS 24 HOURS – FINAL OFFICIAL CLASSIFICATION AFTER 24H OF 24H POS. TEAM DRIVER #1 DRIVER #2 DRIVER #3 CAR NAT. CLASS LAPS 1 Toyota Gazoo Racing Mike Conway Kamui Kobayashi Jose Maria-Lopez Toyota TS050 Hybrid JAP Hypercar H 371 2 Toyota Gazoo Racing Sebastien Buemi Brendon Hartley Kazuki Nakajima Toyota TS050 Hybrid JAP Hypercar H 369 3…

The opening leg of this year’s Bahrain FIA World Endurance Championship double-header will be the first round of the series at the Sakhir circuit to take place exclusively in daylight. The six-hour event scheduled for October 30 will start at 11am local time and finish at 5pm just as the sun is setting. The following Saturday’s eight-hour series finale will begin at 2pm, with the race finishing in darkness at 10pm. Previous WEC rounds, of both six and eight-hour duration, at the Bahrain International Circuit have always finished under the cover of darkness. The inaugural Bahrain 6 Hours in 2012 began at 4pm, as did the 2016 and 2017 editions, while the races in 2013-15 kicked off at 3pm. The start time for this year’s eight-hour event on November 6 mirrors that of the 2019 event. WEC boss Frederic Lequien said: “It will be interesting to see the different strategies that teams adopt for the double-header. “It’s certainly going to provide two different types of race by having one run completely in daylight and the season-finale finishing much later at night.” Circuit boss Sheikh Salman bin Isa Al Khalifa added: “These two contrasting races should offer a variety of challenges to the teams and drivers. “We look forward to welcoming all participants to Bahrain, for what we hope will be a hugely exciting conclusion to the season.” Both legs of the first double-header in the history of the WEC will be fought out on the regular 3.363-mile Grand Prix circuit. The WEC has opted against using one of the BIC’s other layouts, including the 2.202-mile Outer circuit dubbed the ‘oval’ when it was employed for the second leg of last year’s Formula 1 double-header in Bahrain. A statement from the WEC announcing details of the fixtures read: “After consultation with the WEC teams and taking into consideration all the collective feedback, it has been decided that both events will use the traditional 5.4km Grand Prix circuit. “As the track is renowned for its particularly abrasive surface, tyre wear management from the teams and drivers could play a crucial factor in deciding who wins both races.” Bahrain stepped in to host a second round of this year’s WEC after the series was forced to cancel the Fuji round scheduled for September as a result of international travel restrictions into Japan. The WEC is also reviving the rookie test, which will take place after the second of the two Bahrain rounds on November 7. This could present an opportunity for seven-time World Rally Championship title winner Sebastien Ogier to sample Toyota’s GR010 Hybrid. The Frenchman and the Toyota team are in talks about a test as he works towards fulfilling his ambition of racing in the Le Mans 24 Hours.

Former Formula 1 driver Giedo van der Garde will miss this weekend’s FIA World Endurance Championship race at Monza after testing positive for COVID-19. He will be replaced at the Racing Team Nederland LMP2 squad by Paul-Loup Chatin, a regular in the European Le Mans Series and the Le Mans 24 Hours with IDEC Sport. Chatin last competed in a WEC race outside Le Mans in 2016, when he replaced fellow French driver Nelson Panciatici for the final three rounds of the season alongside Ho-Pin Tung and David Cheng at the DC Racing Alpine squad. This is the second change to RTN’s driver line-up for the Italian round of the WEC, which serves as the final preparatory round for Le Mans, after Job van Uitert also returned a positive COVID-19 test ahead of last weekend’s ELMS race at the same venue. RTN had previously announced that Mercedes Formula E driver Nyck de Vries would take van Uitert’s place in the #29 Oreca, having previously been part of the team during the 2019/20 season. Van der Garde’s absence leaves team owner Frits van Eerd as the only driver from RTN’s original driving trio to remain for the Monza race. Van der Garde said he was surprised to have tested positive for coronavirus, having received both doses of the vaccine and not attended any public event in the run-up to the race. “Deal all, I’m absolutely gutted to say that I can’t drive in Monza this weekend because I have tested positive for COVID,” said the Dutchman in a statement on Twitter. “It’s an absolute mystery to me, since I’m fully vaccinated and working my way towards the race – haven’t been to any social gatherings. That’s irrelevant for now though [as] I can’t race. “The guys have found great replacement in Paul Chatin and I wish him, Frits, Nyck and the rest of Racing Team Nederland all the best for the race.” RTN is competing in WEC’s new LMP2 Pro/Am subclass due to van Eerd’s bronze driver status and currently sits second in that classification behind Realteam Racing. It finished fourth in LMP2 and first of the Pro/Am runners in the season opener at Spa, before finishing 10th at Portimao last month.