WEC looks towards IMSA for inspiration

Browse pages
Current page

1

Current page

2

Current page

3

Current page

4

Current page

5

Current page

6

Current page

7

Current page

8

Current page

9

Current page

10

Current page

11

Current page

12

Current page

13

Current page

14

Current page

15

Current page

16

Current page

17

Current page

18

Current page

19

Current page

20

Current page

21

Current page

22

Current page

23

Current page

24

Current page

25

Current page

26

Current page

27

Current page

28

Current page

29

Current page

30

Current page

31

Current page

32

Current page

33

Current page

34

Current page

35

Current page

36

Current page

37

Current page

38

Current page

39

Current page

40

Current page

41

Current page

42

Current page

43

Current page

44

Current page

45

Current page

46

Current page

47

Current page

48

Current page

49

Current page

50

Current page

51

Current page

52

Current page

53

Current page

54

Current page

55

Current page

56

Current page

57

Current page

58

Current page

59

Current page

60

Current page

61

Current page

62

Current page

63

Current page

64

Current page

65

Current page

66

Current page

67

Current page

68

Current page

69

Current page

70

Current page

71

Current page

72

Current page

73

Current page

74

Current page

75

Current page

76

Current page

77

Current page

78

Current page

79

Current page

80

Current page

81

Current page

82

Current page

83

Current page

84

Current page

85

Current page

86

Current page

87

Current page

88

Current page

89

Current page

90

Current page

91

Current page

92

Current page

93

Current page

94

Current page

95

Current page

96

Current page

97

Current page

98

Current page

99

Current page

100

Current page

101

Current page

102

Current page

103

Current page

104

Current page

105

Current page

106

Current page

107

Current page

108

Current page

109

Current page

110

Current page

111

Current page

112

Current page

113

Current page

114

Current page

115

Current page

116

Current page

117

Current page

118

Current page

119

Current page

120

Current page

121

Current page

122

Current page

123

Current page

124

Current page

125

Current page

126

Current page

127

Current page

128

Current page

129

Current page

130

Current page

131

Current page

132

Current page

133

Current page

134

Current page

135

Current page

136

Current page

137

Current page

138

Current page

139

Current page

140

Current page

141

Current page

142

Current page

143

Current page

144

Current page

145

Current page

146

Current page

147

Current page

148

Current page

149

Current page

150

Current page

151

Current page

152

Current page

153

Current page

154

Current page

155

Current page

156

Current page

157

Current page

158

Current page

159

Current page

160

Current page

161

Current page

162

Current page

163

Current page

164

Current page

165

Current page

166

Current page

167

Current page

168

Current page

169

Current page

170

Current page

171

Current page

172

Current page

173

Current page

174

Current page

175

Current page

176

Current page

177

Current page

178

Current page

179

Current page

180

Current page

181

Current page

182

Current page

183

Current page

184

Current page

185

Current page

186

Current page

187

Current page

188

Current page

189

Current page

190

Current page

191

Current page

192

Current page

193

Current page

194

Current page

195

Current page

196

Current page

197

Current page

198

Current page

199

Current page

200

Current page

201

Current page

202

Current page

203

Current page

204

Current page

205

Current page

206

Current page

207

Current page

208

Current page

209

New rules shake-up could see LMP1 cars with road car styling

Full-house racing prototypes that could have more than a passing resemblance to a McLaren P1 or perhaps a Porsche 918 Spyder are likely to be fighting for outright honours at the Le Mans 24 Hours within four years. That’s the direction the regulations for the World Endurance Championship are heading as the rule makers strive to come up with a replacement for the current breed of high-tech LMP1 hybrids.

The idea of prototypes being styled after a manufacturer’s top-of-the-range sports car has emerged from a series of round-table meetings of interested parties organised by the FIA and the WEC promoter the Automobile Club de l’Ouest, the organisations that write the rules for the series. It has been conceived as part of a drive to make the top division of the WEC more attractive for the big car makers in the wake of the withdrawal of Audi last year and Porsche this year.

There has been no formal confirmation of the plan from either the FIA or the ACO, though Vincent Beaumesnil, sporting director of the Le Mans organiser, has described it as “one of the options”. But the brands involved in the discussions are beginning to talk about them. The ideas are undoubtedly gaining traction and the likelihood is that rules allowing — or more likely demanding — manufacturers to style their cars will be put in place for the beginning of the 2020/21 WEC winter season.

“At the moment an LMP1 is a kind of generic prototype and you have to paint it to put your mark on it,” said Toyota Motorsport GmbH technical director Pascal Vasselon, who stressed that this vision for the future of LMP1 would result in the cars remaining “real prototypes” incorporating hybrid technology, though at a lower level than at present.

“The idea could be to go towards bodywork that is clearly closer to real cars — it could interest manufacturers who at the moment are not interested in a generic LMP. When you start talking about sports car-looking prototypes, then it seems there is a lot of interest.

“There is a positive momentum at the moment. There is some convergence and some principles now are set that appear to be satisfying for nearly everyone. But, as usual, the devil will be in the detail.”

The starting point for the discussions was the idea of allowing manufacturers to race hypercars such as the Adrian Newey-designed Valkyrie. This was quickly abandoned on grounds of both cost and complexity. The rule makers are wary of a repeat of the events of the late-1990s that resulted in a line of ever more extreme GT1 cars, culminating in Toyota’s GT-One.

Vasselon explained that there was now “no objective for the cars to be homologated for the road.”

“The category has to stay for real prototypes and to stay away from Balance of Performance [the means used to equalise cars in the GTE class],” he added.  “It is very clear we cannot have BoP in the top category.”

AMERICAN RACING 

At least one participant in the discussions has likened the ideas to the Daytona Prototype international category in the IMSA SportsCar Championship in North America. Car makers can take a chassis built by one of the four licensed LMP2 constructors, fit their own engine and then style the front and rear bodywork, as well as the sidepods. “A DPi on steroids” was the term he used to describe the kind of car the WEC might end up with.

The idea of some kind of spec monocoque being at the heart of the new regulations appears unlikely. The DPi machinery that raced with Cadillac, Mazda and Nissan badges in 2017, which will be joined by the Acuras fielded by Penske in 2018, are LMP2 chassis to their core. They retain everything from their donor car bar key sections of bodywork and their engine.

The new rules, should they go through, would borrow as much from the WEC’s GTE category as from DPi. The idea of performance windows, introduced when a new breed of GTE car came on stream for 2016, would be used to match the aerodynamics of cars not designed entirely according to windtunnel and computer data. The message is that a manufacturer wouldn’t be penalised by styling a car after a particular model.

McLAREN RETURN

Toyota is clearly interested in the new regulations at a time when it is about to launch a range of road cars using the Gazoo Racing under which all its competition programmes are run. Shigeki Tomoyama, the overall boss of motor sport at Toyota, has intimated that the company is ready to make a long-term commitment to the WEC.

“We will probably continue to be racing in a new top-flight class which they are looking to create,” he said at the Tokyo motor show in October. “We are looking to stay – and only with the goal of winning.”

McLaren has also stuck its head above the parapet. The British supercar builder has been talking up its interest in returning to Le Mans, scene of its 1995 outright victory with the F1 GTR, since Zak Brown took over as executive director of the wider group late in 2016. Brown has now admitted that McLaren is in favour of the direction in which the rules appear to be going.

“We like lots of what they are saying,” he said. “With the budgets and the level of technology they are talking, it’s heading in a direction that means there is a strong interest on our part.”

Aston Martin has also been making positive noises about the rules. “If we could race something that was inspired by Valkyrie, for example, that would be amazing,” said Aston boss Andy Palmer.

Porsche has been a participant in all the meetings, despite calling time on its ultra-successful P1 programme for next season. Porsche GT boss Frank-Steffen Walliser said that the company was always ready to “discuss and listen”.

The WEC was hoping to put in place a broad framework for the 2020/21 regulations in time for the early December meeting of the FIA’s World Motor Sport Council. This now appears unlikely because the next rules meeting is scheduled for after the next world council.

More likely is a short paragraph talking about the drive to reduce budgets, maintain technical innovation and ensure close competition between factories and privateers. Any announcement about a new breed of Le Mans prototypes that would capture the imagination of both manufacturers and the fans should follow some time in early 2018.