Motorsport Week reflects on the 2023 FIA World Endurance Championship season, featuring more Hypercar competition, the final year for LMP2 in full-season competition, a send-off for the GTE Am category, and more.
The 2023 campaign felt like the first ‘proper’ Hypercar season in the FIA WEC.
Sure, we had the class in 2021 and 2022, but they were warm up acts for 2023. This heralded the return of Ferrari and Porsche to the series, alongside Peugeot, who entered mid-2022, Cadillac, and Glickenhaus, who had been competing against the all-conquering Toyota since 2021.
Hypercar
In addition, this was the first year the ‘LMDh’-rules cars were eligible for competition. Porsche and Cadillac both entered cars using this ruleset, with the ACO using Balance of Performance to equalise the two “platforms” – the LMH rules being the other one – against each other.
The theory behind the balancing wasn’t inherently based on balancing the performance between the two rulesets, and the cars themselves, like you see in other sportscar series. Instead, the ACO, organisers of WEC and the 24 Hours of Le Mans, used simulations to find the ultimate potential of each car, then balanced them based on those figures.
Was this successful? …Eh. It wasn’t unsuccessful, but it also meant Toyota won 6 out of 7 races, with the Japanese-German team unable to win in France due to a late BoP change that partially blindsided the teams, as they had been told previously the BoP would not change until after Le Mans.
However, that change also gave us one of the best Le Mans in years, with Ferrari, Toyota, Peugeot, Porsche and Cadillac all leading at various points over the 24 Hours.
The year started with Toyota dominating the races at Sebring, Portimao, and Spa. Ferrari took pole at Sebring — intentionally sacrificing race pace in order to take the headlines — and almost took it again at Spa, until Antonio Giovinazzi’s lap was disallowed due to track limits.
While the Ferrari 499P was quick over a lap and generally able to challenge the two Toyotas, it suffered over a race distance due to wearing through its tyres faster than Toyota’s GR010 Hybrid. This of course caused the two 499Ps to have to back off in the race, lest they need to stop more frequently for tyre changes.
Of course, this is a fixable issue. But here we get to the crux of the issue: Toyota had a two-year headstart on the competition. Issues like reliability gremlins, tyre wear, driveability – Toyota fixed those in the two years before the majority of its major competition made their debut.
For the most part Toyota were, far and away, the quickest car all year. Ferrari had its moments — most prominently at Le Mans — and so did Porsche, at Fuji, where they led for over half the race and Ferrari were also on pace with Toyota for a significant portion as well.
Peugeot, meanwhile, suffered with a car that only really worked at Le Mans. The 9X8’s ground effect was clever and innovative, but on bumpy tracks like Sebring, the car lost a significant amount of pace because the air seal between the floor and the ground, created by the negative pressure under the car, was upset by the bumps from Sebring’s famous concrete slabs.
Another problem was the wheel tyre sizes that Peugeot had selected. Originally LMH manufacturers could choose from two wheel sizes — 31-inch front and rear, or 29-inch at the front and 34-inch at the back. With weight distribution a major fact for any racing car, but especially the 9X8 without a rear wing, Peugeot opted for 31-inch tyres on all four corners.
The car’s weight distribution is biased towards the front, making the larger front tyres, in theory, a good choice for the 9X8 — but in practice it didn’t work. The smaller rear tyres and wheels could not get traction out of corners, an issue the team struggled with all year, which wasn’t helped by the weight distribution.
The wingless car, though, worked and worked well at Le Mans, especially when it rained midway through the race. They led by over a minute for a significant period, only dropping back after the rain ceased and the track began to dry.
They did pick up their debut WEC podium at Monza, which with its long straights, similar to Le Mans, suited the car well. But the fact remained that the experimental aerodynamics were, at best, not suited to the tracks WEC races on 75% of the time. The team has already set change is coming for 2024, although has been coy on what exactly that will entail.
Porsche and Cadillac, meanwhile, with the German 963 and American V-Series.R, seemed to be at a disadvantage all year, despite BoP in theory bringing them up to parity. While Porsche’s 963 did improve through the season — leading for well over 3 hours at Fuji after taking the lead on the opening lap — the Cadillac seemed to go backwards, being way off the pace at the final race in Bahrain.
So, what are we looking at next year, then? Well, it seems there may be changes to the Balance of Performance system, to more effectively balance the different cars and concepts. However, teams are not allowed, due to the regulations, to discuss the BoP in any specifics, so finding out what those changes may entail is tricky.
Otherwise, there will surely be work from each manufacturer in the off season to improve on any weaknesses. The fact remains, though, that Toyota still have a target on their back, despite losing at Le Mans in 2023.
And then we have the new manufacturers, in the form of BMW, Alpine, and Lamborghini. These are all LMDh manufacturers, the same as Porsche and Cadillac. The BMW team, run by WRT, will likely have an advantage, as the car has been racing for a year in the American IMSA championship.
The Alpine and Lamborghini will be brand new, so performance is a complete unknown. In addition, the ranks will also be swelled by the Isotta Fraschini team, a long-dormant brand which has been revived and reinvigorated, racing with the Tipo 6 Competizione. We’ll be keeping a close eye on their performance.
LMP2
It feels strange to think we won’t have any LMP2s in WEC next year. The class has been a mainstay of global sportscar and endurance racing for many many years, since before the ACO created WEC. The reasons for their exit from the series are good, logical reasons, but it doesn’t change the fact that LMP2 has brought us some of the best racing in sportscars, plus given many teams and drivers the chance to step into professional sportscar prototype racing.
LMP2 in WEC 2023 was, as ever, fantastic. The era of the ‘super teams’ continued apace, with WRT, JOTA, United Autosports, Prema, and Alpine all represented in the class for the umpteenth year running. And it was excellent to see the small Inter Europol team beat the big boys and take the win at Le Mans. A great moment for an underappreciated team.
In the end, WRT took the title, with Rui Andrade, Louis Deletraz and Robert Kubica prevailing over the trio from Inter Europol. However, for Inter Europol to even get close to challenging WRT, one of the world’s best sportscar teams, is stupendous. And, even better, they beat JOTA and United Autosports.
Inter Europol’s only win of the season came at Le Mans, where they controlled much of the race and had the measure of their competition for much of it. All three drivers — Fabio Scherer, Jakub Smiechowski, and Albert Costa — battled with their counterparts from WRT, Kubica, Andrade and Deletraz, with Smiechowski overtaking Kubica at one point in a fantastic move at the second chicane.
However, in the end, Inter Europol prevailed for their first ever class win in WEC competition, and what a place to take it.
Their form somewhat tailed off after Le Mans — no further podiums — but they did enough to finish a fantastic second to WRT in the championship.
GTE Am
It was, simply put, Corvette’s year in the final year of the GTE regulations in WEC competition. Three wins and five podiums in seven races, winning the championship two races before the end of the season, at Monza was a fantastic achievement, as well as taking the win at Le Mans.
It was befitting that Ben Keating, a loyal competitor in the WEC, who drove six out of 7 GTE cars in his time in the series, won the final championship. Corvette, a relatively new full season entrant in WEC — they only entered full time the year previous, in the Pro class — was somewhat unexpected, but with such a stellar driver line up, it makes sense.
Keating is one of the best amateur racing drivers in the world. Catsburg is a top GT driver, amongst the top sportscar drivers. And Varone is an up-and-coming driver who will surely go onto great things. Indeed, he’s been signed by Corvette as a factory driver for 2024.
Elsewhere, the Iron Dames were a revelation, finally taking their first WEC win of the season at Bahrain. It’s been a long time coming for Michelle Gatting, Sarah Bovy and Rahal Frey, after starting on pole at 3 different races. Corvette took 3 poles as well, with Ahmad Al Harthy’s ORT by TF taking the remaining pole at Spa.
The season was largely characterised by the battle between the Dames and Corvette. While AF Corse did manage two wins, at Spa and Fuji, and Dempsey-Proton another one, it felt like, for much of the year, a battle between the pink Porsche and yellow Corvette.
Keating won’t race full time in WEC in 2024 — he told Motorsport Week at Sebring that he’s not keen on GT3s — but we’ll see him again in LMP2 at Le Mans, the only race that class will compete in next year in WEC.
The Dames, meanwhile, will be back with Iron Lynx, this time driving a Lamborghini. They’ll be competing with the likes of AF Corse, United Autosports, Proton, TF Sport, and Manthey in the new LMGT3 class.
