2025 marks the tenth season of the Michelin Le Mans Cup, with three major new headlines for the season to come:
For the first time, the series will feature three classes, with Silver and Gold rated drivers able to compete together in LMP3. This is is an addition to the two pre-existing classes, the Bronze/ Gold combination that previously occupied the LMP3 class now redubbed LMP3 Pro-Am. GT3 continues as before.
The second headline concerns the LMP3 cars, now in their third generation with the new-for-2025 Toyota twin turbo powerplant.
That revamping of the cars has seen both Ginetta and ADESS re-enter the marketplace, and both are represented in the Le Mans Cup in addition to Ligier and Duqueine, both of whom also have revised cars for 2025. The coming season then represents the first time in either ELMS or Le Mans Cup history that four marques are set to be represented for the whole season.
The final major headline is that most of the 2025 races will revert to two hours in duration (with the exception of Silverstone and the Road to Le Mans events). This has been made possible because of the enhanced fuel efficiency of the turbo engine over the older Nissan normally aspirated V8.
Whilst the full season entry list numbered 44 cars, it seems that Barcelona will see 42 with 18 in LMP3, 16 in LMP3 Pro-Am and the planned 8 GT3s all on-site by Tuesday ahead of the Series’ Wednesday Prologue test.
Missing in Spain are the second (#43) InterEuropol Pro-Am Ligier, which had been listed with just Jakob Smiechowski to drive, and the LMP3 class TS Corse Duqueine, which had both drivers ‘TBD’.
LMP3: Ligier v Duqueine v Adess v Ginetta
Reigning champions COOL Racing return to defend their title under a new name of CLX Motorsport, with 2024 Drivers Champion David Droux partnering Cedric Oltramare in the #97 Ligier. The Swiss team will also run a second car in the top class listed as #87.
2024 Championship runner-up R-ACE GP will also run two cars in LMP3, the French team choosing to run the Duqueine D09 chassis for both entries. Last year’s vice champion Hadrien David will be joined by Hugo Schwarze in the #85 Duqueine.
2023 Champions Team Virage also return with two cars in the LMP3 category. Sacha Lehmann and 2024 Ligier European Series Champion Theo Micouris will pilot the #16 Ligier and Samir Ben and Willian Karlsson will race the sister #74 entry.
2021 Team Champions Nielsen Racing have elected to race the new Adess AD25, with two entries in LMP3. Former drivers’ champion Colin Noble will race the #7 Adess-Toyota alongside emerging young British driver Tom Fleming.
Four-time Team Champions DKR Engineering will run the only Ginetta G61 on the grid, with Wyatt Brichacek and Freddie Tomlinson sharing the driving duties for the Luxembourg-flagged team.
Newly crowned Asian Le Mans Series LMP3 Champions Bretton Racing will run one Ligier JS P325 in LMP3, with another in LMP3 Pro/Am, with Swiss driver Gregory De Sybourg and Britain’s Haydn Chance in the #26 Ligier-Toyota in LMP3.
Spain’s Maximus Mayer will race in the #20 High Class Racing Ligier this season, the 2024 Road To Le Mans race winner partnering Denmark’s Philip Lindberg for the Danish team.
Spanish team CD Sport will also run a pair of Duqueine D09s in a smart new white and blue livery, one in LMP3 and one in LMP3 Pro/Am, with an all-French driver lineup in the #30 entry of Thomas Imbourg and Arthur Rogeon.
French teams ANS Motorsport and Forestier Racing by VPS will each run two Ligier-Toyotas in LMP3, the latter team with Matthieu Vaxiviere on the ownership/ management team.
Another new team for 2025, 23Events Racing, will run a pair of Ligiers, one in LMP3 and one in LMP3 Pro/Am, with the returning Reiter Engineering doing likewise, both cars in the near iconic Felbermayr family colours.
Gebhardt Motorsport, who step up from Prototype Cup Germany, will run a single Duqueine D09.
LMP3 Pro/Am: 16 cars for Opening Race
2022 MLMC LMP3 Team Champions Racing Spirit of Leman return to the Michelin Le Mans Cup with a single Ligier-Toyota for Dominik Schraml and Sebastian Schmitt.
2023 MLMC LMP3 Drivers Champion Gillian Henrion will race alongside race winner Eric De Doncker in the #98 Motorsport98 Ligier.
2019 ELMS LMGTE Champion Fabien Lavergne will partner fellow Frenchman Romano Ricci in the #86 R-ACE GP, the only Duqueine D09 on the LMP3 Pro/Am grid and a third car entered by the team alongside their pair in LMP3.
Rinaldi Racing will enter a pair of Ligiers in the LMP3 Pro/Am category, with Australian Asian Le Mans Series race winner Griffin Peebles joining Austria’s Steve Parrow in the #66 car.
Inter Europol Competition’s planned two-car entry in LMP3 Pro/Am is down to just one for the season opener, the #34 appearing in the team’s traditional green and yellow colours.
High Class Racing adds an LMP3 Pro-Am Ligier as the #49 for Team Principal Anders Fjordbach and the extraordinarily evergreen Mark Patterson, back in the paddock in Europe at 73 years young after playing a full part in a Championship-challenging effort in the Asian Le Mans Series this past winter.
Reiter Engineering’s LMP3 Pro-AM car sees one of a pair of father and son efforts with second and third generation Felbermayrs Horst and Horst Felix sharing the #77 Ligier.
P4 Racing, GG Classics, M Racing (with ex Audi LMP1 racer Pierre Kaffer on the driver strength) and the ‘dad and lad’ efforts of the van de Snell family at More Motorsport will each run a single Ligier JS P325.
GT3: Aston Martin v Ferrari v Mercedes-AMG v Porsche
The full season entry is just eight entries for the GT3 class but at least includes four GT3 manufacturers.
Reigning champions AF Corse will enter a single Ferrari 296 GT3 this season, with Italian Elisio Donno and Monaco’s Alessandro Cozzi sharing the driving duties in the #51 entry.
Former champions Kessel Racing will run a pair of Ferrari 296s, with David Cleto Fumanelli being joined by Turkish driver Murat Ruhi Çuhadaroglo in the #33 car, while ex-rebellion LMP1 racer Andrea Belicchi and Lorenzo Ferdinando Innocenti will pilot the sister #17 Ferrari.
The fourth Ferrari 296 GT3 will be entered by Catalan team Biogas Motorsport, who return for a second season with Josep Mayola Comadira and Marc Carol Ybarra.
There are two Porsche 911 GT3 Rs on the grid. 2017 MLMC GT3 Champions Ebimotors will run a multicoloured car for Romanian drivers Fabrizio Broggi and Nicolas Sergiu.
The second 911 will be racing in the distinctive Iron Dames livery, with F1 Academy Champion and 2024 Ligier European Series race winner Marta Garcia Lopez racing at home in Barcelona alongside Vanina Ickx in the #83 Porsche 911 GT3 R run by Proton Huber Racing.|
Austrian outfit and International GT Open regulars Team Motopark will run the only Mercedes-AMG GT3 on the grid for Lukas Donner and Heiko Neumann.
The final entry for the opening round of the 2025 Michelin Le Mans Cup is the Code Racing Development Aston Martin Vantage GT3 EVO with IMSA GTD racer Gunnar van der Steur as a late replacement in the #11 car.
