When the 24 Hours of Le Mans 2018 will he run on 16-17 June, all garages will once again be completely occupied.
60 cars will start this year’s race, with numbers made up from the usual FIA WEC teams plus a further 24 invited teams.
The ratio between LMP and GT cars is exactly 50/50, at least on the current list. There is also a reserve list with six LMP2 cars and three GTE Am cars, but we will get back to that list.
The 10 LMP1 teams competing in the FIA WEC will be the only ones in the 2018 edition. That could very well change in 2019, if some new teams wants to dip their toes in the water, before jumping on the WEC train for 2019/20.
There will be nine extra LMP2 cars, which will be a good mix of ELMS teams, plus the two extra Jackie Chan DC Racing cars, who won their entry by winning the two Championhips in the Asian Le Mans Series. That makes the team, which is run by JOTA Sport, have four cars at Le Mans for the race this year. Eurasia Motorsport will also join in from the Asian LMS, but they had to apply like everybody else, since they didn’t receive an automatic entry.
There will be a total of 20 LMP2 cars entered this years Le Mans race.
Photo: JJ Media
There are no surprises in the GTE Pro field, other than AF Corse entering an additional Ferrari 488 GTE Evo, to be piloted by Toni Vilander amongst others. Corvette Racing, Ford Chip Ganassi Team USA and Porsche once again have two extra cars each. That brings the GTE Pro total up to an impressive 17 cars!
The GTE Am category has 13 participating cars. Other than the nine FIA WEC cars, Ebimotors will join with their ELMS Porsche, and JMW Motorsport with their ELMS Ferrari. Keating Motorsports has received an invitation from the IMSA series, and will be entering a Ferrari, to be run by Risi Competizione. Proton Competition will bring an extra Porsche too.
If we look at the reserves list, there are well known names in the shape of Spirit of Race, Scuderia Corsa, Krohn Racing and ARC Bratislava. They all have to hope for other teams to drop out, or they will end up looking at everybody else doing the race.
The full list of 60 + 9 cars can be found here.
