Le Man Racing (Prototypes and GT)

[MafiaBrett]

Wondering if anyone else on the forums is a huge fan of ACO/FIA's Le Man racing.. you know the 24 hours of Le Mans and the World Endurance Championship?

 

I'm just incredibly hyped for 2015 year of racing. LMP1 class with 4 manufacturer teams split into 2-3 cars with 2 privateer teams alongside them. If ACO is able to keep this going we might see LMP1 manufacturer racing surpass the greatness of the late 90s early 2000s. Peugeot said late 2014 they wish to return but have to deal with financial problems first, Lamborghini 'wants' to develop their own LMP1 in the near future, and finally Bentley has had talks of returning to LMP1 racing due to the rising competition. Besides those manufacturer teams, there have also been a few Privateer teams wanting to step up.

 

Manufacturer teams for 2015

Audi - R18 etron quattro  (2-3 cars)

Toyota - TS040 Hybrid    (2 cars)

Porsche - 919 Hybrid       (2-3 cars)

Nissan - GT-R LM Nismo (2-3 cars)

 

If you are a fan of the racing, maybe haven't been paying attention lately or just getting into Le Man racing I'll do a quick past history lesson why I feel 2015 is going to be a standout season (mostly for LMP1).

 

1990s. Prototype racing has been around for while but it was in the mid to late 1990s that saw the Le Man Prototypes stand out from the other GT class. Before they were unstable and could barely last the 24 hour endurance races but they started to become tougher and quite a bit faster than the GT cars. They also went through tons of spec regulations and went under different names (C1, LMP1/C90, WSC, LMP1, LMP, LMP900). It was in 1999 that it was a standout year because manufacturer involvement in the Prototype class. Toyota, Nissan, Audi, BMW, Oreca, Panoz, Porsche, and Mercedes. 

 

2000-2002.  A lot of the manufacturer teams from the 90s dropped out after 1999 and went into different kinds of racing like Formula One... Audi, Panoz, and Cadillac were the only manufacturer teams left. Early 2000s saw the rise of privateer teams without the funding of manufacturers. Competition was pretty close but favoring the Audi's. Also there was a split in LMP racing between open cockpits and closed cockpits, and to a extent we still see it today in the form of LMP1 vs LMP2.

 

2003-2005. Manufacturer involvement was extremely low during these years and mostly just played as just a advice/minor support role towards the privateer teams who were using previous year manufacturer specs, etc. So therefor these years a lot reference it as the privateer golden age (haha or maybe its just me). 

 

2006-2011. These years can be summed into 2 phrases. "The rise of diesels" and "Audi vs Peugeot". Audi manufacturer support came back into Prototype racing with the R10 as a diesel, and a year later Peugeot with its 908 diesel. The diesels were far more powerful and faster than the petrol counterparts which lead to the idea that LMP1 should be for manufacturer/diesel teams only and LMP2 for the privateer teams. However a few petrol LMP1 privateer teams remained and still do to this day but are a low disadvantage. Some consider the Audi vs Peugeot battles the best prototype racing ever, and I agree with it. There might not have been a lot of diversity in manufacturers but with Audi sporting 3-5 cars and Peugeot sporting 3-5 cars and how balanced the cars were.. it was extremely fun to watch.

 

2012-2014. Peugeot ended up abandoning Le Man racing due to financial reasons. Toyota returned to LMP1 and basically all the drivers and teams who raced the 908's switched over to Toyota. So essentially the Audi vs Toyota LMP1 battles remained very similar to the Audi vs Peugeot. And it wouldn't take long for Toyota as a manufacturer to create a race winning machine. In 2014 Porsche returned to Prototype racing, since it was their first year with lots of newcomer drivers, they were the underdogs but still pretty competitive late season. During this time it were 2 new official rules.. manufacturer teams who ran diesels now are running Hybrid systems and all LMP1 cars would have to be closed cockpit, LMP2 cars could still be open cockpit but in 2015 they are also being forced to be closed cockpit.

Now comes 2015, Nissan as a manufacturer will return to LMP1 racing soon this year, and Porsche learned a lot from its first season + tons of off season testing. I'm hoping that LMP1 exceeds all the previous years and gives fans a hell of a good race at the 24 hours of Le Mans to watch. Toyota, Porsche, and Nissan looking to overthrow Audi from its 24h of Le Man throne that it has been holding for four years.

 

Here was the first race of the 2015 season "WEC 6 Hours of Silverstone" if you want to see what this racing is like.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VibdXK7X7o

 

 

 

 

Now there might not be a lot of fans of prototype racing, and maybe you prefer the GT racing. That's fine as the GT racing is still pretty competitive and always fun to watch Porsche vs Ferrari vs Corvette vs Dodge Vipers vs Aston Martins, etc. GT racing use to be split into GT1 and GT2, however after 1999. GT1 racing collapsed all over the world due to rising costs. GT2 racing is the only thing left in Le Mans nowadays and is split into GTpro and GTam. Very similar cars however GTpro use current specs with professional drivers and GTam uses previous year specs with more amateur drivers. 

 

Tons of people get confused when it comes to LMP1 vs LMP2 vs GT1 vs GT2 vs Japans Supercar vs Daytona Prototypes vs GTD racing and specs that separate the classes. And want to know on average which one is faster, etc.

I don't blame them, for a while I didn't either because over the past 10 years it's been changing so much.

 

But I have found this on another site that can compare lap times at Circuit Okayama from 2009 to give a idea how they rank but remember that the LMP1 was a petrol, and diesel/hybrids tend to run even faster

- Lola Coupe Judd (LMP1): 1'19.143 min
- Pescarolo Mazda (LMP2): 1'23.790 min

- ZENT CERUMO SC430 (GT500): 1'24.069 min
- Aston Martin DBR9 (GT1): 1'27.515 min
- Aston Martin Vantage (GT2): 1'30.721 min
- JIMGAINER ADVAN F430 (GT300): 1'32.798 min 

 

As for Daytona Prototypes (USCC) they basically classify somewhere close LMP2, faster on straights but slower in turns, overall slightly better. As for GTD racing (USCC) they are basically GT3 spec cars slower than the GT300's.

Edited April 18, 2015 by MafiaBrett