The 8 Hours of Bahrain produced a bittersweet final event for the Porsche 963 era of HERTZ Team JOTA.
The #12 car led the race before a Virtual Safety car, and the subsequent bunching of the pack dealt a double blow to the effort.
“The timing of the VSC hurt us,” said team co-owner Sam Hignett, “and then we were hit in the pack by a GT car and got a puncture at the very start of the lap, the slow in-lap and subsequent repairs put the car out of any chance of a decent result.
“We strategized our way to the front off the first safety car and then off the final safety car before Will got hit by the GT car. We were ahead of the #8 and we were the only two cars on the same tyre strategy. It’s hard to take the final result from that position.”
The #12 car dropped down the order, but in the meantime, the sister #38 was having a strong run too, and getting stronger as the race went on.
“Actually the only solace in the #12 car having had a disaster was that it didn’t take points off the #38 car in the (Hypercar World Cup) championship.
“It’s worth pointing out too that I think Jenson (Button) was the only driver to double-stint tyres on that final stint which is why he dropped from third to seventh by the end, but he gave it everything.
“In reality though all he had to do was stay ahead of the #83 because, going into this weekend, the #38 was fourth in the World Cup. It’s now second.”
So a one-two in the privateer standings for the HERTZ Team JOTA pair, with an overall race win at Spa into the bargain for the #12. It’s a mark though of the ambition here that even that draws critical comment from Hignett:
“I think it delivered more than we hoped it would. If we look at our goals at the end, at the beginning of the season, we’ve exceeded our goals.
“The annoyance is that we should have been competing for the overall championship. There were too many mistakes during the course of the year that took us out of points-paying positions.
“If we hadn’t had the problems in São Paulo, if we hadn’t had the reliability issues in total, we would have been right up there in the championship.
“Who knows what could have happened at Le Mans if we hadn’t had to build a new car?
“So, yeah, the frustration is we definitely could have been challenging for the overall championship this year.”
The Porsche chapter is now over and the team’s 963s are unlikely to race again.
The Cadillac plans for 2025 meanwhile, with the team taking the reins of the expanded factory programme in the FIA WEC, now shift into overdrive.
What does the immediate future for the new-look Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA effort look like?
“Busy! Busy at the factory, we’re on track within the next 10 days, just to do a shakedown, a rollout, and then we’re out testing in December.
“Then we’re testing in January, and then obviously racing the following month in Qatar.”
The team will take delivery of the current WEC Cadillac. That will serve as its European test car. In addition, two new chassis are set to be delivered as its primary 2025 race cars, plus a third low-mileage chassis which will act as on-event spare.
All of that preparation will see JOTA focussing on preparations back at home. The team did not take part in the Michelin tyre testing in Bahrain, with Cadillac the only factory not to be represented there. Plenty of testing is already penned in on the calendar thought.
