Project 1 reveals 'Art Car' ahead of Le Mans Test Day

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By: Stephen Kilbey | 13 hours ago


FIA WEC GTE Am points leader Team Project 1 is set to become the latest team to field an ‘Art Car’ at the Le Mans 24 Hours.

The German team, which is hoping to secure the GTE Am title in the season finale at Le Mans later this month in its debut season, is one of many teams that has updated its car’s livery for the big race. Ford is running ‘celebration’ liveries, Porsche has added gold trim to its WEC Porsches and re-applied Brumos colors to its cars from IMSA, JMW has opted for a yellow Le Mans-themed camouflage livery and multiple other teams have tweaked their existing paint schemes.

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More Le Mans liveries revealed

“Art Cars have a long history in Le Mans and this stunning design continues the story,” says Project 1 team manager Axel Funke. “Our first season in the World Endurance Championship has been a special one for all of us and we’re all the more excited about presenting our fans and partners with another highlight for the most important race of the year.”



Project 1’s Porsche 911 RSR, which will be driven by full-season drivers Egidio Perfetti, Patrick Lindsey and Jorg Bergmeister, features a unique design by American artist Richard Phillips, with assistance from Andy Blackmore.

“This is a great chance to display my art in a completely new way. I decided to combine three works for this Le Mans design,” said Phillips. “That’s a new aspect and shows how everything in terms of car design can be transposed and put into practice. I’m very proud of the result and hope to provide fans with a lot of pleasure.”

The rest of the teams set to contest this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours are all set up on site at Le Mans with their cars too. The new pit garages (at pit-in) for Anglo-American team United Autosports are being used for the first time, and most of the 186 drivers set to contest the race are on site. The current omissions are the drivers currently racing at Detroit in IMSA or at Paul Ricard in the Blancpain Endurance Cup.

Testing at Le Mans is set to start tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. local time. There will be a total of eight hours of track action across the day.




Art Car, Le Mans, Test Day, Le Mans/WEC

 

INSIGHT: Can ‘Success ballast’ save LMP1?

Images by LAT


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By: Stephen Kilbey 11 hours ago


The second Le Mans 24 Hours of the 2018/19 FIA WEC ‘Super Season,’ which serves as the final round, is almost upon us. This year’s big unknown is whether or not LMP1 will deliver any sort of entertainment after a season of Toyota dominance over the privateer pack with its pair of near-infallible TS050 HYBRIDs.

Equivalence of Technology has governed the class this season, as it has in previous years where the World Endurance Championship had multiple factory hybrid teams. The key difference this time around is, it hasn’t been able to produce good racing. Toyota Gazoo Racing’s resources, driver set and car have all proven too much for the privateer LMP1 teams, who are still keenly pressing on to develop their machinery.

It’s not a surprise that Toyota has been able to dominate — it has the fastest, most reliable car on the grid, and it’s not even close. That, coupled with the built-in advantage Toyota has in the pits (being able to fuel far quicker than its privateer counterparts) has made for some rather forgettable encounters.

That hasn’t stopped the ACO from attempting to close the cavernous gap between the hybrid and non-hybrid prototypes. Now, many will (rightly) criticize the governing body for reacting far too slowly to Toyota’s dominance, and for not being transparent enough when making various changes through the season. The tide, though, may be turning.

Refueling time and coping with traffic are both elements of Toyota’s advantage in the races.


The ACO released a Q&A with technical director Thierry Bouvet this week, and it included some rather interesting passages. It served as a chance for Bouvet to answer some of the more pressing questions the public and members of the paddock have regarding EoT. And it leaves us with much to ponder.

Bouvet was quick to point out that the purpose of the current EoT was “designed to ensure that the privateers who came in with new, non-hybrid cars in 2018 can rival with the Toyota TS050 Hybrid that the manufacturer has been developing since 2012.”

In that, the system has indeed failed. Over a year into the ‘Super Season’ and still Toyota has been winning races by multiple laps. Not just because the other P1s have faltered (though reliability issues and incidents haven’t helped), but because the TS050s can carve their way through traffic far more effectively over the course of the races thanks to the boost their hybrid systems provide.

The TS050’s systems and the way in which it delivers performance are just a cut above the privateers and have been developed over multiple seasons, so it’s been quite a task to rein them in.

LMP1 Privateer prototypes can get close over a single (clear) lap, and in recent races both SMP Racing’s BR1s and Rebellion’s R-13s have taken the fight to the Japanese goliath in qualifying. The races though, have been a different story. Time and money are luxuries that the privateers haven’t had…

Privateer LMP1s like SMP’s are in the same class, but a different league in the races.


Understandably, Bouvet recognizes that the net result of the mixture of technologies and the EoT process has not produced good racing.

“We would have liked closer races between the hybrid and non-hybrid cars,” he said. “We are already working on a slightly different system for next season which could also take race results into consideration.

“Equivalence between naturally aspirated and turbocharged engines has been achieved in all races. Between hybrid and non-hybrid cars, we have approached our goal but have come up against the maximum physical limits of non-hybrid cars. Engine power couldn’t be increased any more, nor car mass reduced.

Just what is this “slightly differen

 

Toyota paces Le Mans Test Day, Corvette tops GTE Pro

Image by Rainier Ehrhardt/LAT



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By: Stephen Kilbey | 6 hours ago


It will come as no surprise that Toyota Gazoo Racing’s pair of TS050 HYBRIDs topped the times in the Le Mans Test Day, the Japanese marque returning to La Sarthe with its tried and tested cars for the second time during the WEC ‘Super Season’.

The best time from the Toyota camp came with 30 minutes remaining in the four-hour afternoon session, which was held in searing heat. Sebastien Buemi was the only driver to break the 3m20s mark with a 3m19.440s in the No. 8. It was however, a slightly slower lap than the best time set during last year’s Test at Le Mans, a 3m19.066s.

Nevertheless the No. 8 finished up the day’s running comfortably at the top of the times, just over a second clear of the No. 7 which led the way at various points during the eight hours of track action, and 2.7 seconds clear of the fastest non-hybrid, the No. 1 Rebellion. R-13.

Both Rebellions ran the new low-downforce aero kits, and weren’t able to eclipse the best time set by an R-13 at last year’s test, a 3m19.680s. This time round, the Swiss team’s best tour of the circuit was a 3m21.323s from Andre Lotterer. It is however, very early days here.

SMP’s pair of BR1s were next in the running order, coming in fourth and fifth in the times, 3.4 and 3.9 seconds off Buemi’s time respectively. All four Rebellion and SMP cars lapped within a second of each other here.

Sixth was DragonSpeed’s BR1. The American team, fresh from its maiden Indy 500 run, had a troubled day and only managed 31 laps, the fewest in the class. Ride height issues in the morning and a gearbox problem during the afternoon set the team back here.

However, Renger van Der Zande was upbeat about the car’s potential in conversation with RACER, the Dutchman explaining that the team would be in the mix in the times had it not hit traffic at the Porsche Curves during its quicker laps.




In GTE Pro, it was Corvette Racing that ran fastest, Mike Rockenfeller driving its No. 63 C7.R setting a 3m54.001s.

“It’s always good to be the fastest, but today doesn’t count,” Rockenfeller said. “It was really good for me, though, as sometimes I struggle coming from a DTM car to a GTE car. Last year I just did the race and missed the pre-test, so today I got lots of laps in. I think the morning the circuit was greasy but it got so much better towards the end.”



Corvette Racing C7.R of Jan Magnussen, Antonio Garcia and Mike Rockenfeller. Image by Rainier Ehrhardt/LAT


Completing the top three in the class were the No. 67 Ford and No. 64 Corvette, which improved on pace throughout the day.

The top 15 in GTE Pro ended up within 1.2 seconds of one another, the only cars truly off the pace being the two BMW Team MTEK M8 GTEs, which were over two seconds off at the bottom of the times.

A couple of cars suffered issues during the Test in Pro, the No. 95 losing a lot of track time with an electrical issue which brought out red flags in the morning session after Marco Sorensen stopped at the Porsche Curves.

Risi Competizione’s Ferrari was also in the wars. Team newcomer Oliver Jarvis, who was one of 12 drivers that flew straight to France from the IMSA Detroit GP overnight, ground to a halt at one of the chicanes down the Mulsanne Straight, bringing out a safety car.

The car also suffered a sensor issue, which cost the team further time after it lost two hours of the morning session due to the timing of the drivers’ briefing for the latecomers.

Ho Pin Tung set the pace in LMP2, with a time in the final minutes of the Afternoon session. His time was a 3m28.504s, to put the Dunlop-shod No. 38 Jackie Chan DC Racing ORECA ahead of the DragonSpeed ORECA which looked set to end the day’s running fastest.

“I hope we can keep this one-lap performance up for race week. I don’t think anyone is showing their hand. I’m sure when qualifying comes in race week we will produce good lap times,” said Tung.

“Being quickest doesn’t always mean you’ll win the race, though. The competition is hard in LMP2, there’s only four points between our car and the Alpine. We will be pushing!”

Pastor Maldonado put Michelin-shod DragonSpeed second with a 3m28.769s, while Nicolas Lapierre put the WEC points-leading Alpine third.

The fastest of the other chassis in the class ended up seventh, the Racing Team Nederland Dallara ending up two seconds off the top time.

Further down the order there were plenty of rookies getting up to speed with the Circuit de la Sarthe today in LMP2.

Arjun Maini was one of them, the former F2 racer with Trident and Haas F1 development driver, who is driving in LMP2 for the first time this year with RLR Msport in the ELMS was really encouraged by his first day of track action at Le Mans. The Indian driver said it’s taken a bit of time to get up to speed with the 13.6km circuit, but he now feels comfortable ahead of race week. RLR’s ORECA ended up 14th with a 3m32.192s.

Then there was GTE Am, which WeatherTech Racing eventually topped thanks to a 3m56.862s from Toni Vilander. The three drivers, (Vilander, Rob Smith and Cooper MacNeil) traveled from far and wide, but had a strong day of running. Vilander and MacNeil jetted in from Detroit while Rob Smith drove to Le Mans from Paul Ricard, the former GTE Am class winner competing in the Blancpain Endurance Race at the French circuit.

“It’s been a busy schedule for me the past six weeks,” said Vilander. “It’s been a positive day. Our story is different — we don’t race in the WEC, we have a brand-new car that was used on a racetrack for the first time today. For us it was important to see the car was performing well. We’ve all come from America, and I’m proud to be here and part of this program.

“We were six seconds from the pole position from last year, so that says it all. There were lots of cars on fast laps diving into the pits.”

The top five in Am were all Ferrari 488 GTEs, the No. 61 Clearwater 488 ending up second, ahead of the No. 54 Spirit of Race, No. 57 Car Guy Racing and No. 60 Kessel Racing examples. Best of the rest was the Gulf Racing Porsche, eight tenths off.

Next up for the teams and drivers is Scrutineering in the Le Mans city center next Sunday, ahead of race week.

RESULTS




Le Mans, Test Day, Toyota, Le Mans/WEC

 

Le Mans 24 Hour Spotter Guide

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By: Marshall Pruett | 13 hours ago


A great 24 Hours of Le Mans tradition continues with the release of Andy Blackmore’s 2019 Spotter Guide. Depicting every car in next week’s race, the incredible resource — part art, part treasure map — the automotive and race car livery designer’s work with IMSA, FIA WEC, and other spotter guides makes tracking the various entries, with all the little differences identified, a must-have ahead of the June 15-16 French classic.

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Download Blackmore’s new 2019 LM24 Spotter Guide HERE.


Le Mans/WEC

 

Kobayashi, Toyota lead opening Le Mans practice

Image by Toyota


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By: Stephen Kilbey | 9 hours ago


The No. 7 Toyota TS050 HYBRID set the fastest time in Le Mans 24 Hours Free Practice this afternoon with a 3m18.091s late in the session from circuit lap record holder Kamui Kobayashi.

That effort pipped the No. 11 SMP Racing BR1 to the top spot, after Le Mans debutant Stoffel Vandoorne set a 3m19.931s on the drying track at La Sarthe which was hit by rain showers throughout the four-hour session.




The No. 3 Rebellion R-13 ended up third, after sitting atop the times until the sun came out with just over an hour to go, following a 3m19.960s from Gustavo Menezes.

Completing the top five was the No. 8 Toyota, and the No. 1 Rebellion, 2.8 and 3.1 seconds off Kobayashi’s time respectively.

It was an incident-packed session due to the rain, with the Krohn-liveried No. 99 Proton Porsche the only real casualty from the changeable conditions. Tracy Krohn had a huge off at the exit on the Mulsanne Straight, severely damaging the car, and the barriers. Officials were forced to put out red flags for 45 minutes to clear up the debris and repair the barriers.




Fortunately, an official update from the FIA WEC revealed that Tracy was “conscious and in good spirits. He is being taken to the hospital for precautionary checks.”

Another driver to have an off — but thankfully not into the barriers was — Frits van Eerd in the Racing Team Nederland Dallara, the Dutchman spinning the car multiple times down the Mulsanne straight. The Larbre Competition Ligier also had an off into the gravel at the very end of the session.

Leading the way in LMP2, meanwhile, was the No. 48 IDEC Sport ORECA 07 Gibson, Paul-Loup Chatin setting a 3m28.363s benchmark
time. The top five in the class were all ORECA chassis in Free Practice, the No. 31 DragonSpeed 07 and No. 39 GRAFF example completing the top three.

Best of the other chassis was the Racing Team Nederland Dallara, which ended up sixth, with a 3m30.611s.

In the GTE ranks, Porsche topped both classes. In Pro it was a Porsche GT Team 1-2, the No. 92 WEC full-season 911 RSR the fastest of the packed 17-car class, thanks to a 3m52.149s late in the session. Mathieu Jaminet put the IMSA guest-entered example second in the class.

Fastest of the other factories was the No. 71 AF Corse Ferrari, Sam Bird setting a 3m52.742s. Ford’s fastest GT (the Ganassi Team UK No. 66) ended up fourth with a 3m52.778s from Stefan Mucke.

Australian Bathurst 12 Hour winner Matt Campbell was the pace-setter for Dempsey Proton in Am, driving the No. 77 911 RSR. A 3m55.304s was his best tour of the 13.6km circuit.

RESULTS

UP NEXT: The first of three qualifying sessions begins at 10 p.m. local time, and finishes at midnight.


Kamui Kobayashi, Toyota, Le Mans/WEC

 

Corvette Racing’s Le Mans tales, with Doug Fehan

Image by John Thawley/LAT


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By: Marshall Pruett 8 hours ago


As RACER celebrates Corvette Racing’s 20th anniversary at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, program manager Doug Fehan (pictured above with driver Antonio Garcia) offers his thoughts on how the uniquely American team has approached the classic French endurance race, and how, since its first appearance in 2000, the country has influenced the proud factory GT effort from Michigan.

“That it gets back to our early days before we ever came over here. And we knew, obviously, about the physical challenges of putting together a team, and getting them transported over here to compete. But there were other challenges as well. We knew coming over here, there were some real horror stories about how Americans were treated, and there wasn’t much to those stories, although it was a challenge that we knew we weren’t going to be openly embraced as Americans, OK. But we weren’t treated badly. We weren’t treated rudely, but we wanted to do things that would endear ourselves to not only the race, but to the town of Le Mans.

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“Gary Claudio was our marketing manager and he was just a brilliant guy. I mean, he was a people person. He could come up with stuff that he thought would work, and would help us overcome the stigma of being Americans and actually try and get us to a point where they liked us, because we knew that would be helpful. I can remember coming over here the first year. Quite frankly, the Corvette had a terrible reputation. I mean, it was pimps, prostitutes, and drug dealers who owned Corvettes in France. And that’s a pretty tough image to shake. So, he put together just a magical plan. We went to scrutineering and it was our very first time here.

“We knew that French people were crazy about cowboy, western movies. They love American movies, all American movies. They watch the movies here in English, and they love cowboy movies. We’re going over there, we’re going to scrutineering and we’re all going to be in cowboy hats. So we showed up in cowboy hats, and the fans, they didn’t know what to think. They were loving it, but they just didn’t know what to think. This was their first exposure to an American team like this.

“And so, I also set up a program. We were down in the center of [Place du] Jacobin, which is just a big old parking lot in front of the cathedral. It’s kind of down in a hole, and the cars [entering scrutineering] arriving early would all be cordoned off and the people were not even allowed to get close. Each team had stanchions set up to keep them away. You know, just shooing them away.

“I said, ‘We’re not doing that.’ I said, ‘We get down, and I want you to open that up and the first kid that comes along, I want you to open the door up, get them in the car and let his parents take a picture of him inside the race car. And then line them up, and let’s do that for every kid that comes along before we get called up to scrutineering.’

“And I’ve got to tell you, the first parent was very reluctant, because they had spent their lifetime in Le Mans knowing you’re not supposed to get close to the cars. So when a team was inviting you to come to the car, you could see the reluctance to do that. But that first dad, I’ll never forget him and his little kid, was probably seven, eight years old, and the kid of course didn’t know any different. So he was excited. We got him in the car. David James put him in the car, his dad was snapping picture. Mom was in the background. Everybody was smiling. The next thing you know, the parents were lined up, the kids were lined up, to get their picture taken in the Corvette. It was a great moment in time.

“We finish scrutineering. And so you line up to do the official photograph in that prescribed area for the yearbook thing that they do. And so we all line up, got our hats on, take the picture and of course they’re shooing us away, ‘Allez, allez, go, go, go, go.’ I said, ‘No, no, no, just one minute.’ Claudio had gotten each of us a beret and a fake mustache. We took off the cowboy hats, put on berets and stuck on fake mustaches, and stood there and crossed our arms. The crowd broke out in applause.

“The tower on which the photographers were all gathered, you know, that bridge that they erect, was shaking so badly because they were laughing so hard they couldn’t take a picture. So they had to wait to get that thing settled down, snap the photographs. The audience is applauding. And the next day you look above the fold in La Sarthe, which is the regional paper, and our first trip there, there’s the Corvette team at scrutineering with berets and fake mustaches on.

Corvette Racing’s C7.R arrive in the Le Mans town center. Image by Rainier Ehrhardt/LAT


“That was the first step in creating what we wanted to do, and that was traditions that would be tied to Corvette, because we knew the French culture was a tradition-based country. Its architecture, its history, its art, its literature, they revere that here. They have huge respect for that. Wonderful museums. They embrace the past.

“We wanted to do some things of course that would help endear us, and so when you look forward to all those things, Mike West playing the [the U.S. national anthem on] guitar at noon, that was huge here. That was huge. People love that. They look forward to it. Mike then had moved down because he went to go do Cadillac program and some other things. We needed something to replace that.

“We had the train horn. We brought that in. We blow that every noon. That’s a tradition. When we go to the driver parade, the beads like they do at Mardi Gras, that’s part of the tradition. When we finish scrutineering, we hand out posters to all the crowd. That’s our tradition. We have a huge banner thanking the people of Le Mans. You’ll see that in pictures. We unroll that and the drivers hold it up. ‘Thank you, people of Le Mans.’ That’s our tradition.

“That’s how we’ve ensconced ourselves. That’s how we’ve captured the hearts of the people here. And this race is centered around the people of Le Mans. [Everything] happens at the racetrack, but believe me, these people own this race, the people who live here. It’s been an amazing ride, and an amazing experience.”

Enjoy the full conversation with Fehan below:

Click here for international link


Corvette, Le Mans, Le Mans/WEC, Podcasts

 

Radio Le Mans partners with RACER for 24-hour marathon

Image by Rainier Ehrhardt/LAT


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By: Marshall Pruett | 9 hours ago


As Radio Show Limited’s featured annual product, the global English language resource known as Radio Le Mans, sparks to life for the 87th running of the world’s greatest endurance race, an ongoing promotional partnership with RACER Magazine will ensure the North American market will receive every minute of coverage from Circuit de la Sarthe.

Playing 24 hours a day, seven days a week, RSL’s standard offerings are complemented by blanket coverage from scrutineering, pit lane, and its core trackside commentary booth overlooking the Ford chicanes. At Le Mans, RLM is available via 91.2 FM, and worldwide on the RS1 channel found on www.RadioLeMans.com.

Leading up to the start of this weekend’s race, access to RLM coverage will also be available in the U.S. on Sirius/XM Satellite Radio, with Sirius 137 and XM 202 being the featured channels to use. RLM’s featured show, the Michelin Countdown to Green, will bring listeners into the final phase of pre-race preparations, and after the 24 Hour has concluded, the Michelin Post Race Tech show will answer questions submitted by fans.

More Le Mans/WEC!

The Day At Le Mans, June 12

No.7 Toyota tops opening Le Mans qualifying - then crashes

Corvette Racing’s Le Mans tales, with Doug Fehan

Helming RLM’s announce team is John Hindhaugh, who makes his 30th appearance as a commentator at Le Mans, and he’ll be joined by Jonny Palmer and Paul Truswell in the booth. On pit lane, the familiar voices of Shea Adam, Joe Bradley, Bruce Jones, Nick Daman, and Andrew Marriott will report on all the strategy and action taking place.

Along with a number of featured programs that will air, including ‘Marriott’s Memories’, RLM fans will be able to watch the commentary calls live as StudioVision cameras spool up inside the announcing compound.

 

The Day at Le Mans, June 11

Image by LAT



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By: Marshall Pruett June 11, 2019 6:38 PM


It’s the third installment of The Day At Le Mans, a new companion series for the 87th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, with DailySportsCar.com’s Graham Goodwin and Stephen Kilbey on the ground grabbing short interviews with some of the key players in the race.

Interviews:

• Tom Onslow Cole & Valentin Pierberg
• Tristan Gommendy
• Jules Gounon (photo above)
• Anders Fjordbach
  

Le Mans 24 Hour, Podcasts

 

MotorTrend to air 24 Hours of Le Mans live

Image by JEP/LAT


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By: Marshall Pruett June 11, 2019 9:34 AM


The 87th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans will be aired Saturday and Sunday in the U.S. on the MotorTrend TV cable channel. In Canada, it will air on the Velocity channel.

The network will present the 24-hour endurance contest live and free from flag to flag, with nine-time Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen among the featured presenters. Practice and qualifying Wednesday and Thursday, and the Saturday morning warmup session, will be shown via the subscription-based MotorTrend App.

24 HOURS OF LE MANS Broadcast Schedule (*All Times ET)

Free Practice

MotorTrend App

Wednesday, June 12 at 9:45 AM



Qualifying 1

MotorTrend App

Wednesday, June 12 at 3:45 PM ET



Qualifying 2

MotorTrend App

Thursday, June 13 at 12:45 PM ET



Qualifying 3

MotorTrend App

Thursday, June 13 at 3:45 PM ET

Warm Up

MotorTrend App

Saturday, June 15 at 2:45 AM ET

24 HOURS OF LE MANS

MotorTrend App and MotorTrend TV (*In the U.S.)

MotorTrend App and Velocity Canada (*In Canada)

Saturday, June 15 at 8 AM ET


Le Mans/WEC

 

The Day at Le Mans, June 10

Image by Trienitz/LAT


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By: Marshall Pruett | June 10, 2019 2:55 PM


It’s the second installment of The Day At Le Mans, a new companion series for the 87th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, with Graham Goodwin and Stephen Kilbey on the ground grabbing short interviews with some of the key players in the race.

Interviews:

1. Bill Riley
2. Stoffel Vandoorne
3. Pipo Derani
4. Olivier Beretta
5. Stephane Sarrazin
6. DragonSpeed’s Drivers
7. Larry Holt
8. Arjun Maini
9. Jorg Bergmeister
10. Nicki Thiim
11. Tracy Krohn
12. Jeroen Bleekemolen
13. James Calado
14. Job van Uitert
15. Christian Reid

Le Mans/WEC, Podcasts