Family affairs in LMP3

There are three cars in the Michelin Le Mans Cup, where the two drivers know each other exceptionally well.

At the opening round of the 2019 season at Paul Ricard in the south of France, there are three father-and-son combinations racing.

We have had Alexander Talkanitsa Snr and Jr in the same car for several seasons, where AT Racing most recently raced in the European Le Mans Series. They have changed to the Michelin Le Mans Cup now, where they can do all the running themselves, without an added third driver. They will be racing with #90 at AT Racing in LMP3.

Eric and Adrien Trouillet will share Graff #9 in the LMP3 category. They raced together in the 2018 LMC season too, but they didn’t manage any major results. The family owns a rental business, where they rent out all kind of trailers, so the motorsport is just a secondary thing for them.

We already know the Stubbe Olsen name from the European Le Mans Series 2018 and Asian Le Mans Series 2018/19 – but that is with Christian behind the wheel. He will be too at RLR MSport in ELMS this year, but the special thing about his LMC programme, is that he shares the car with his father, Tom. Tom told Racing24-7.net the other day, that it actually wasn’t the original plan for himself to drive, but since Christian had been signed up to do both championships all the way. Since the team hadn’t found a Bronze Driver to pair up with Silver ranked Christian, he opted to take on the helmet himself.

He is, however no, stranger to race cars. Tom and Christian have raced historic Formula 3 for some seasons, where Christian actually won the FIA historic title in F3 in 2018.

Tom hadn’t driven a LMP3 car at all prior to the first practice on Wednesday morning at Paul Ricard, so every single of the 44 laps was well needed. Of course he didn’t set the world alight with his first laps, but he slowly and surely got faster an faster, ending up doing respectable laptimes, considering he had never driven such a car before.

The plan for Tom and Christian is to share the car at the first two rounds of the Michelin Le Mans Cup. Their hope is for another driver to show up and pair with Christian at the Road to Le Mans, which is a support race for the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June. But as Tom said it – I would REALLY like to drive at the Le Mans circuit, but it does cost a bit of money…