Silverstone reprieved

Traditional UK enduro dropped… but not for long

While Silverstone cannot match the sports car history of Le Mans or Sebring, it has been part of the World Endurance Championship since the concept’s reintroduction in 2012 and has a long, proud tradition of hosting top-class long-distance races.

That’s why its initial omission from the new-look WEC schedule came as such a surprise.

The will-it-won’t-it saga of its place on the calendar was finally resolved in the British track’s favour – little more than two weeks after it fell off the schedule.

Silverstone thought it had a deal for an August date, but that went out of the window as series bosses firmed up their ideas for the transitional superseason with two races apiece at Le Mans and Spa. The British fixture was regarded as collateral damage.

But WEC chief Gérard Neveu remained complimentary about a track he called “a temple of motor sport”. The door was open for a return to Britain in 2019/20, he said. Then it emerged that Silverstone was on stand-by in case the WEC couldn’t fill the February TBA date on its original 2018/19 calendar.

As a consequence, Silverstone will be back on the schedule late in August 2018. It will be a double-header event as in the past, with a round of the European Le Mans Series on Saturday and the WEC event on Sunday.