In this exciting era for sportscar racing, other phenomena are emerging too, including an increasingly large number of young drivers who are realising that this part of the sport offers an exciting and viable career path.
Whilst some of DSC’s 2024 awards have had blindingly obvious winners, here the judgements are much more subtle. And in truth, any short list could have been 10 or even 20 drivers long.
We’ve chosen, in this instance, to focus on a group of drivers, that we personally have had the opportunity to see up close on and off track. But even there, there’s a truly impressive group to be considered.
In LMP3 there are multiple worthy contenders. ELMS title winner Gael Julien was rapid, consistent, resilient and a delight to deal with in the paddock. It’s a combination that will surely catch the attention of an aspirant team or three in the future.
Gillian Henrion too has emerged as a real ‘gun’ in P3 competition. An opportunity at the next level surely beckons for the 21-year-old, who came so close to scoring a third title in three years, on a third rung of the ACO ladder with Team Virage.
He has attracted the attention of LMEM in his selection for the Rookie Test in Bahrain, and has been assisting Ligier with the development of its new JS P325. Again, a blend of on-track ability and off-track personality should serve him well for the future.
In Le Mans Cup, the searing pace of 20-year-old Hadrien David stood out too. His abilities kept the R-ace GP in the title hunt until the very last round, pushing COOL Racing and its established talents to the limit.
The European Le Mans Series’ LMP2 class featured a glut of young talent this year, including Alex Quinn, who spent the season racing alongside Kriton Lentoudis and Richard Bradley in LMP2 Pro/Am.
Not only did he play a key part in steering the #20 ORECA to a class win at Imola, he executed an outstanding fuel-saving strategy which wrong-footed the rest of the P2 Pro/Am field and almost snatched a title win from AF Corse.
That leaves us with two more names, the final honourable mention and the award winner.
First up, Esteban Masson. His pace with Kessel Racing/Car Guy helped the Swiss-Japanese team to race wins and in Europe, title contention that forced Iron Lynx to utilise team orders at the end of the final ELMS race to take the LMGT3 crown. His performances were also convincing in the all-too-often underwhelming AKKODIS ASP Team FIA WEC LMGT3 effort.
It’s clear that his talents have been recognised by Toyota. We will be hearing a lot more about this young man in the years to come.
Dailysportscar’s 2024 Rising Star of the Year
Jonny Edgar
A fighting run to the title in the tight-knit European Le Mans Series LMP2 class showed steel, but there were convincing performances too in IMSA’s P2 class with the Sean Creech Ligier from 20-year-old Jonny Edgar.
It’s always impressive to see an up-and-comer standout in a driver line-up featuring established, quality names. And Edgar did just that racing alongside Acura GTP driver Louis Deletraz and WEC overall race winner Robert Kubica with AO by TF, in a category littered with Hypercar drivers, F2 hot-shoes and sportscar stars with real pedigree.
He’s a pleasure to deal with off-track too. Prior to the ELMS season opener, DSC sat down with him in the paddock at Barcelona, and it was clear back then he had real ambition and was eager to push through the campaign ahead.
The sky is the limit for everyone on our list for 2024, but for DSC, Edgar in particular just about edged it here.
The best news is that it appears there’s a lot more to come in 2025 for him, including a full season in the FIA WEC’s LMGT3 class with TF Sport. We are eager to see what the encore brings…
