Penske’s major rivals
WRT
Reigning P2 champion defends its title with a two-car squad. Rene Rast bolsters the lead crew alongside fellow Audi factory driver Robin Frijns, although silver Sean Gelael, runner-up last year with Jota, isn’t a like-for-like replacement for Charles Milesi. Ferdinand Habsburg moves over to what looks on paper to be a second-string car to share with Norman Nato and Rui Andrade.
Prema Powerteam
The Italian single-seater powerhouse takes in its first sportscar campaign with what might just be the strongest line-up. European Le Mans Series champions Robert Kubica and Louis Deletraz are joined by Lorenzo Colombo, a race winner in FIA Formula 3 last year but still silver-rated.
United Autosports
The British squad has put together two strong crews for its first multi-car World Endurance Championship attack as it attempts to regain the title it won in 2019-20. Josh Pierson, at just 16, is teamed with Oliver Jarvis and Alex Lynn, who is replaced by Paul di Resta this weekend. Former champs Filipe Albuquerque and Phil Hanson are joined by team returnee Will Owen.
Jota
Will Stevens, a multiple winner with the team in 2016-20, comes in alongside Antonio Felix da Costa and Roberto Gonzalez in the car that finished third last year. Fewer ‘fake’ silvers should work in their favour. The line-up of Ed Jones, Jonathan Aberdein and Oliver Rasmussen could be the sleeper in the pack.
Vector Sport
The line-up put together by an all-new team based at Silverstone underlines its ambitions. Audi man Nico Muller is paired with Sebastien Bourdais and Ryan Cullen for the season, with Mike Rockenfeller coming in for the Frenchman first time out at Sebring.
and Ryan Briscoe, after showing promise without threatening Toyota across the three races of its debut season.“we had a clear view of the limitations of the car after Le Mans,” says Luca Ciancetti, who heads up the race programme at Podium Advanced Technologies in Italy. “I think we will have a much stronger package this year.”
He stresses that the focus, within the limits laid down by the car’s homologation, has been on reliability of the non-hybrid 007, although one development allowed in the rules for this year should offer a significant gain: fly-by-wire brake control is now permitted at driven wheels at the rear.“with the simulation that we have done, we can see that we can have much better brake bias control in different sections of the track and in different sections of each corner,” Ciancetti explains. “It offers interesting potential in terms of outright speed and our pace over a stint on the tyres.”
The other major regulatory change for 2022 affects Toyota. The minimum speed at which LMH hybrids can deploy power through the front wheels has been moved from the technical regulations to the BOP. This means it can change from track to track and, when the four-wheel-drive Peugeot arrives, car to car. For Sebring, this minimum has been set for the Toyota at 190km/h in all conditions, which compares to 120km/h when the car was on slick tyres and
150 when on grooved rubber last year. Toyota has yet to reveal what effect that will have on the performance of the GR010, but it is clear that its decision to switch to wider rear tyres and narrow fronts is related to the rule shift.
Ciancetti is confident that the BOP will give Glickenhaus a shot this year.“we have had a year of good processes to make the category a real BOP category where the performance is balanced between the different concepts and different cars,” he says. “If we do our job we can be close to our competitors, but at the end of the day results are not only about pure performance.”
GTE Pro
Corvette Racing has been a fixture at Le Mans since 2000, only missing the big race in 2020 as a result of the COVID pandemic.
Yet this will be the first time it has contested a full season in the WEC. It’s taking on a pair of factory cars from each of Ferrari and Porsche in GTE Pro with a lone Chevrolet Corvette C8.R.
Chevrolet has opted for a split programme: Nick Tandy and Tommy Milner are racing one car in the WEC, while Antonio Garcia and Jordan Taylor take part in the IMSA Sportscar Championship with another. The new strategy can be explained by the rules shift over in IMSA. GT Le Mans for GTE machinery is no more and has been replaced by GT Daytona Pro for GT3 cars, as well as a C8.R in modified form to level up its performance with the new breed.
It’s easy to explain the strategy, says Tandy, who is returning to the WEC for a full campaign for the first time since his year in the Porsche 919 Hybrid LMP1 in 2017.“Le Mans is so important to the Corvette programme and it would be difficult if we were only doing that one race in full GTE trim and on the confidential Michelins [rather than the GTD control tyres],” he says. “This gives us the best possible chance at Le Mans.”
Corvette Racing has turned out in the odd WEC race outside of Le Mans in the past; four times since 2018. The C8.R made two of those starts – at Austin in 2020 and Spa last year – without distinction. The consensus was that the car was given a conservative BOP as the rulemakers felt their way with the new mid-engined machine.
Tandy agrees, pointing out that the Corvette was competitive by the time it got to Le Mans for its belated debut in the big race. He suggests that it’s in the interests of the powers that be to get the BOP right.“at the end of day the championship needs good racing and the BOP process is there to create that,” he says. “We are very hopeful that, between the three manufacturers, it’s going to be close all year.”
The BOP published in advance of last weekend’s pre-season prologue test at Sebring didn’t appear to be in Corvette’s favour. The C8.R was given an engine air-restrictor smaller in diameter than at Spa last year. That can be interpreted as a reflection of the Chevy’s pace at the 24 Hours, when it was all but a match for Le Mans winner Ferrari, which received a draconian BOP hit next time out in Bahrain.
Tandy is confident that Corvette Racing can make a running start at Sebring this weekend. The quirky Florida track, he points out, is the team’s home from home.“the team has 20 years of experience there and it’s the place we do a lot of testing,” he says. “It’s our back yard.”