The final ELMS race meeting of the year is over and, as we have noted on these pages previously, with it goes the end of the GTE era in Europe.
The post-season ELMS ‘Rookie’ test saw no GTE cars in action – though oddly it did see the Goodyear GTE tyres still in use by AF Corse on a pair of testing Ferrari 296 GT3s.
The cars themselves are set for retirement, display, potentially historic racing and, in the case of at least one of the Aston Martins, resettling as a GT3 Evo for the 2024 ELMS!
One GTE race remains to be run, in two week’s time for the FIA WEC season finale at Bahrain International Circuit.
LMP2 And LMP3 Still Booming
As GT racing in the ELMS reaches a transition, there is stability for another year in both LMP2 and MP3 and there was ample evidence of the success of both formulae in the Portimao paddock.
ORECA’s spare chassis on-site was newly completed 07 Chassis 121 (the total number of chassis built is very marginally less than that) with 2017 vintage chassis 005 still racing in the hands of DKR Engineering, this ex-Graff racing car took the Asian Le Mans Series Championship earlier this year and will race on in 2024.
ORECA is believed to have significant numbers of new cars on order for use both as race cars and as spare chassis.
Arriving on Monday in the paddock was High Class Racing’s new Ligier JS P320, news on that team in the coming days. This car is chassis 297. That’s a truly remarkable total since the formula was introduced in 2015!
RLR MSport Sold
Long-time ACO racing contenders RLR Sport will be under new ownership by the 2024 season as Nick Reynolds and his wife Lindsey take a step away from the pressures of team ownership. Nick will still have a role in the ELMS paddock, to be revealed in due course, and is likely too to feature in a prominent role in the IMSA paddock too.
Alan McGarrity will continue to work with the new owners from a new base close to Silverstone and away from the team’s heartland in Bolton, and takes on the Team Manager role. Entries are planned in LMP3 for the ELMS and Michelin Le Mans Cup for 2024 together with a return to the Ligier European Series. More or less all of RLR’s staff are either continuing an involvement or have found gainful employment elsewhere in the paddock it seems.
End Of Season Awards
Sunday evening saw the traditional end of season awards bash held at the circuit, MC-ed by Brin Vandestick.
Championship trophies were warded for the to-three finishers in all classes across the Ligier European Series, Michelin Le Mans Cup and European Le Mans Series
Ask also now traditional a number of special awards were made.
Michelin Le Mans Cup Personality of the year went to the retiring John Schauerman, the always cheery American is stepping away from racing after 8 years in LMP3 with Cool Racing and latterly United Autosports where he scored the race win at Spa this year together with Wayne Boyd.
ELMS Team of the year went to Duqueine Team after a feisty season-long effort in LMP2, Team Owner Gilles Duqueine accepted the award on behalf of his squad.
Rookie of the Year went to newly crowned LMP3 Champion Alex García who combined with team-mates Adrien Chila and Marcos Siebert to secure the title (a second consecutive title win for Cool Racing) with a round to spare. (Alex is pictured below on the right with Adrien Chila on the left).
On site to see out his spell as reigning Champ was Mo Smith, here chatting to his 2022 team-mate Malthe Jakobsen. More from Malthe on DSC in the coming days.
ELMS Person of the year was United Autosports’ Managing Director Max Gregory, Max was cited by the ELMS for his efforts to engage constructively with his paddock peers and the race organisers throughout the season. Max is pictured below on the right – John Schauerman on the left with United’s double Portimao race winning crew (and Championship runners up) Oliver Jarvis, Marino Sato and Phil Hanson).
You can read DSC’s outlook on the most likely shape of the 2024 ELMS grid early next week.
