This week is Online Racing Industry Week (presented by epartrade.com and racer.com) and there have been a number of fascinating interviews conducted during the event.
Amongst them was a multi-faceted exchange between Racer.com’s Marshall Pruett and LMEM CEO Frederic Lequien.
Marshall covered a range of newsworthy issues including the future of the ACO’s GT classes, future developments in the FIA WEC calendar and the direction that the WEC will take in developing their online and broadcast packaging in preparation for the opportunities offered by the forthcoming explosion in factory prototype participation.
Future GT Classes
In answer to a question of the shape of the future class structure in the GT sphere for the WEC Frederic confirmed that a development of the standard GT3 specification was still under consideration and that the pressure to retain a Pro class into the GT3 era has not been successful:
“I can remind you what we officially said during the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
“For 2024 it will be the end of GTE and we will switch to a new GT regulation which will be based on the GT3 regulations.
“We are still thinking about adding something that will be a little bit different from GT3. It could be GT3 Le Mans or something like this. We are currently working on this.
“Also what is also 100% sure is that for 2024 we will have only GT Pro-Am, not Pro.”
Calendar
On moving back to a full-season calendar:
“We strongly believe that it was the right decisions to maintain six rounds for the next season (2022) for obvious reasons.
“We still have to manage the COVID situation and that affects the budget of everybody, and especially the budget of the teams.
“So we preferred to do something which is let’s say ‘safe’ in terms of organisation, instead of saying that we are going to do 7, 8 or 9 rounds, and then have to cancel some events.
“So we wanted to stay reasonable and close to economic reality and that was really appreciated by the teams.
“But for 2023 we should increase by one race and for 2024 by two.
“We race six to eight to 24 hours, the WEC has no intention to have 12 or 15 races a year. It’s not possible. So I would say that eight, maybe nine, is the maximum and is the right format.”
WEC App And Future TV Packaging
Marshall also asked questions around the current packaging of TV and online content for the FIA WEC, in particular the model that sees the core online offering for race coverage sit behind a paywall on the WEC’s App:
“The app is something which is very important to us because it gives the possibility for different fans all over the world to watch races live with some fantastic onboard cameras also.
“So of course, we believe that this is something which is very important, and we are going to invest a lot of money into a very strong App – a different one – in the future.`
“I think that the TV rights market is changing a lot at the moment. And this is a strategy we are working on right now.
“Digital is more and more important for us and we have to manage that, I would say permanently, with TV rights. We cannot do what we want. We have to respect the contracts we have signed with some very important partners, with Discovery, with Eurosport and companies like this.
“So it’s not so easy, but it’s clear that our strategy is to go more and more on digital and to keep some very strong partners for television.
“And we know that our format, I mean, the format of sportscar and endurance racing, is not the perfect one for television.
It’s much more suited for an App for example. You can go, get connected and choose what you want to see. But on television, you cannot broadcast six, eight, or 24 hours of it live, it is not possible.
“So digital is important. But once again, we cannot forget that we still have some very important contracts in TV broadcasts. So we have to work all together to deliver something which is good for the fans.
On A Future WEC Equivalent Of Netflix “Drive To Survive”
“It’s more than a desire that we do it and unfortunately, I would like to tell you something, but I cannot.
“Yes, we’re working with some very big players. And we should announce something very soon.
“I think from next season we will start to see a lot of ‘reporters’ cameras almost everywhere!”
