7 things to watch out for at Le Mans 2021
It's time for the greatest endurance race in the world, here's what to keep your eye on at La Sarthe...
Ladies and gentlemen please take your seats and fasten your belts, it's time for the 2021 Le Mans 24h.
The greatest endurance race in the motorsport world commences on Saturday afternoon, and this year's event is already writing its name in the history books.
Hypercars take to the 13.626km Circuit de la Sarthe for the first time, replacing the outgoing LMP1-Hybrid rocketships. But beyond the top class there's plenty of storylines emerging and worth keeping your eye on.
Whether a seasoned Le Mans fan or someone watching for the first time, here's 7 things to look out for:
1. Reliability matters more than ever
It has been a bumpy start in 2021 for the new Hypercar class. All three manufacturers taking part, Toyota, Glickenhaus, and Alpine, have suffered technical issues in the three World Endurance Championship races ahead of Le Mans.
Toyota, in particular, have been suffering troubles in the shorter endurance races, and have admitted there's no letting off at La Sarthe despite winning overall the last three years albeit with a different car. The GR010 Hypercar has had numerate issues en route to this year's race, and even during Wednesday and Thursday's practice and qualifying sessions the team still has problems to iron out.
With new cars comes new car problems, as such the top priority for the five Hypercars will be getting to the end. For the first time in nearly a decade, being the fastest car out on track has lost significance, and we should expect to see a more 'old school' endurance race where one mantra rings true: 'To finish first, first you have to finish'.
2. Can the #7 buck the trend?
Everyone wants to win Le Mans, and every team showing up has that one goal in mind. One squad, however, certainly wants to win more than anyone else on the grid.
Image: Toyota Gazoo Racing
The #7 Toyota crew of Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and José Maria Lopez have had the pace over the last three years at Le Mans, but in an era which saw Toyota faced little challenge for the overall win they may have seen their best chances to win come and go.
As great as the pace has been from the trio, they have lacked one vital ingredient; luck.
In 2018 the team lead two thirds of the total laps before being overtaken on Sunday morning, in 2019 a faulty wiring loom on an antenna prompted the team to pit with a false puncture warning, losing the lead within the final hour, and last year the #7 was dominant in the first 12 hours before a fractured exhaust handed their #8 car teammates a lead they would not relinquish.
They've landed the first blow on the competition, as Kobayashi claimed pole in Thursday night's Hyperpole session. Can the #7 team finally win at Le Mans?
3. Could Glickenhaus spring a surprise?
One of the most talked about storylines in 2021 has been the presence of American privateer Glickenhaus.
The New York-based team had a baptism of fire in WEC competition at the 8h Portimão, before a massive leap forwards at 6h Monza which saw the team lead a race for the first time as the #7 Toyota stopped out on track.
Team Owner Jim Glickenhaus has been vocal in his belief that his cars are built to win Le Mans, and will be more competitive at the twice-around-the-clock enduro.
Image: @24hoursoflemans Twitter
Pace in practice and qualifying hasn't backed that up, but at Le Mans that doesn't mean anything once the checkered flag falls on Sunday afternoon. History only remembers the winners. The goal for the Glickenhaus team is to run the two #708 and #709 SCG 007s reliably, and stay within touching distance of Toyota and Alpine.
If they hit troubles, Glickenhaus have got to be there to pick up the pieces...
4. More night racing than usual
For the second time in two years the 24h Le Mans takes place outside of the usual mid-June weekend and with this comes a whole new set of conditions and challenges the teams face.
Image: @24hoursoflemans Twitter
For starters the average temperature is higher in August than June, forcing teams to adjust tyre pressures to ensure the car can produce grip and alter radiator inlets to keep things cool in the warmer conditions.
With the heat comes an increase in humidity, and a weather forecast that currently offers warnings for rain in the area on Saturday night.
To make matters worse, a later race date means the drivers will have to deal with almost three hours more night running than usual.
As if racing with 61 other cars on track wasn't already hard enough...
5. Privateers taking the fight to the GTE PRO Manufacturer
The GTE PRO class has been the category to watch since 2017. Fast, loud, and beautiful GT machinery knocking the living daylights out of each other over 24 hours of white-knuckle racing.
However, over the past two years the category has seen Ford and BMW depart from the competition, and at times the entry list has seemed bare especially when Corvette were forced to miss last year's race due to travel restrictions.
Image: @WEC Twitter
In 2021 the Corvettes are back with the debuting C8.R, and combined with the Porsche and AF Corse WEC teams we have six factory-backed cars. The total number in class becomes eight once you add in the #72 HubAuto Racing and #79 WeatherTech Racing Porsches.
HubAuto Racing are the first Asian team to compete in the category, and made history as Dries Vanthoor claimed pole in sensational fashion on Thursday evening. Crossing the pond with Corvette, the Sebring 12h GTLM class-winning WeatherTech Racing squad feature 2018 GTE-Pro winner Laurens Vanthoor and 2015 Overall winner Earl Bamber in the driver line-up.
Both teams have displayed pace in practice, and both have the potential to leave the big brands scurrying back to their headquarters with an embarrassed look on their faces...
6. Jan and Kevin Magnussen's first race together
Even the average motorsport fan will have heard of the Magnussen name, and it's likely you're more familiar with former-McLaren and Haas F1 driver Kevin.
But his father, Jan Magnussen, is something of an icon in endurance racing and the 48 year old Dane is a four-time Le Mans winner with Corvette.
This year the two will race in LMP2 together in the all-Danish #49 High Class Racing Oreca.
Kevin is signed to Peugeot's Hypercar programme that will join the ranks at some point in 2022, and Jan's career is into its twilight years despite no drop-off in speed, but expect this to be the one and only time the father-son team race at La Sarthe.
7. A reminder that anything is possible
There are four official classes (Hypercar, LMP2, GTE-PRO and GTE-AM) but their is one car on the 61-car strong grid that doesn't fall into these categories, and it's a car worth keeping a look out for.
The #84 Association SRT41 Oreca looks like normal LMP2 car, under the skin it is heavily modified to allow its physically impaired drivers to compete.
Image: FFSA
The team is owned by quadruple amputee Frederic Sausset who raced at Le Mans in 2016, and features former MotoGP rider Takuma Aoki and Nigel Bailly who are both paralysed from the waist down. They are supported by four-time Le Mans entrant Matthieu Lahaye.
Watch the team stop at nothing to get through the race at Le Mans, despite the unique difficulties they face the drivers and team never stop smiling.
A reminder that anything, absolutely anything, is possible.
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Comments (10)
Just imagine all five Hypercars go out and LMP2 wins overall. It's not far from being realistic...
I miss Audi and Porsche.
They’ll be back in the next couple of years with a LMDh car along with Peugeot, Ferrari and maybe more. The next few years will hopefully see a massive rise in popularity for Sportscar racing
Agreements! Counter-takes! Opinions ripped straight from Reddit, oh my!
Re:n.1: I love this point. Weirdly enough, we're coming back to a true test of longevity instead of the 24-hour sprint that characterized the 2010s LMP1 era, even if the ACO half-arsed its execution. Sure, the cars are slow (good job, I guess), but it also means the knife edge isn't as much of a problem as before. This is good for Glickenhaus (more later) as it means they can just stay within range and not conk out, but we're also looking at a Toyota and Alpine team who have books upon books of contingency plans for everything that can go wrong, something Jim doesn't have. It's that playbook of strategies that will form the basis for the action.
Re:n.2: Toyota, for one, is mostly fine, though honestly, it's hard to bet on them given how cursed they seem to be in general, even when they win and only Rebellion could hope to fight them. However, they have mountains of experience, so a "safe" race for them could still mean that they'll run rings around the rest.
Re:n.3: Practice and qualifying times imply that Glickenhaus is about 3 or 4 seconds off the pace of the Toyotas, which, over the course of the 24 hours, makes for terrifying compound interest payments. Fortunately, they can save time in the pits, but one mistake is gonna be twice as painful for them. More than just taking advantage of Toyota and Alpine breaking down, Glickenhaus must also watch their timings: they can't be over eight seconds down per lap.
Re:n.5: Team Corvette is the clear underdog here, fighting two fully matured platforms from Porsche and Ferrari who have enough data to stop Pratt & Miller at every turn. But that's why I'm plugging for them here: they have much to prove for the C8.R's first LM outing, so it'd be interesting to see if their car can keep up. Projections reckon they are, which is good news for me.
Re:n.7: same goes for SRT41, who, while I don't peg to be hares in this race, should still finish the race, which in itself is an achievement. Any podium or top-15 placing is a bonus for them. I just don't want to see their campaign die.
Overall: Welcome to the new frontier. Peugeot is due next year, but for now, LMH as a whole is about to be put into the lava pit. The performance of EVERY CAR HERE shall dictate whether or not Ferrari and others will pursue medium-term efforts or if other marques will go LMDh instead, if at all. Because if this Le Mans brings out exciting, close racing with minimal breakdowns and either Toyota or Glickenhaus win, it'll prove the viability of the subclass as a platform, and can give other marques the incentive to go wild and make hypercars that ACTUALLY MATTER beyond the 0.001% of people. Otherwise, we'll never see this live beyond 2024.
I hope toyota wins
Yeah
Great to see that Aston have done the top gear thing with their sponsors stickers. Just had one in the pits with the doors open and it says SEMEN in big bold capitals.
Full sponsor is 4HORSEMEN with 4HOR behind the door.
Car #33
We posted this on DriveTribe’s Instagram a couple days ago! Super funny 😂
Would have been better if they opened both doors for the combined effect of SEMEN 4HORS