Hypercars get Le Mans power boost

The Toyota and Glickenhaus Le Mans Hypercars are set to race at full power in this month’s Le Mans 24 Hours. They will begin the event with the same horsepower with which they have competed in the previous two rounds of the World Endurance Championship rather than the lower level originally envisaged for the French enduro.

The Toyota GR010 HYBRID will be allowed a peak power of 515kw and the Glickenhaus 007 LMH 520kw as at Monza last month and the Algarve circuit near Portimao in June, according to the Balance of Performance table published for this weekend’s Le Mans test day. The LMH rules lay down maximum power levels for the class of 520kw for regular WEC races and 500kw for Le Mans.

There has been no explanation of the move, but it is understood to reflect the efforts of the rulemakers – the FIA, and WEC promoter and Le Mans organiser the Automobile Club de l’ouest – to maintain a separation between the Hypercar and LMP2 classes. The proximity on lap time of the P2 cars to the LMH machinery and the grandfathered Alpine LMP1 has been a major topic of discussion over the opening three rounds of the 2021 WEC.

The only change in the Hypercar class

BOP table for the test at Le Mans concerns the Alpine-gibson A480 run by the French Signatech team. The maximum energy it can use over a stint has been reduced from 918 megajoules to 844MJ.

Toyota undertook its pre-le Mans shakedown at Spa last weekend. Kamui Kobayashi and Brendon Hartley gave the two cars their final systems checks.

Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe technical director Pascal Vasselon said: “The shakedown ran smoothly without any surprises. We ran checks on the various systems to be sure everything is in good order before the Le Mans test.”