2 steps forward, 1 step back: WEC Fuji date change has wide impact on Endurance racing world

Sometimes, being a Motorsport fan can be incredibly painful. For the delight of the Automobile Club de l’Ouest’s announcement of a full grid of 36 cars for the 2018/19 FIA World Endurance Championship’ “Super Season”, 60 cars for the 2018 edition of “The Great Race” itself, the 24 Hours of Le Mans and a remarkable 41 cars for the 2018 European Le Mans Series, the follow up that the 2018 6 Hours of Fuji has been moved (again!) to allow Fernando Alonso the chance to race in the full season (good), returned to its original 13th and 14th October, which clashes with Petit Le Mans (bad), brings some disappointment, and a large amount of frustration for factory GT teams and fans alike.

The recently approved WEC ’18/19 calendar had Fuji’s 6 Hour race listed as the 4th Round of the championship on the 19th-21st October, after being moved away from the Petit Le Mans date the weekend before to prevent a clash. However, with Alonso-mania heading down the Endurance portion of our sport thanks to Toyota and McLaren, the ACO and FIA decided to push the meeting back to avoid a clash with the US Grand Prix (a source of much focus for Liberty Media, owners of Formula 1, where Fernando is still riding a tidal-wave of popularity). Whilst this in itself isn’t an inherently bad plan (after all, there is so much Motorsport these days we simply can’t avoid clashing), the new challenge thrown in is that the race clashes with Petit Le Mans.

Whilst yes, it’s great Fernando can race in 2018 uninhibited (a situation that may not last, mind!), much more of the World Endurance Championship core customer base (read – 5 full season GTE Pro teams, all with 2 car entries, as well as other teams and drivers throughout the field) will now miss out on chance for American glory, American marketing opportunities, and ultimately, American sales, for no fault of their own. The ACO and IMSA relationship has been strained at times over the years – this no doubt will only stoke the fire for more potential trouble.

For context, we need to look at IMSA, and more specifically, the WeatherTech Sportscar Championship. Whilst Petit Le Mans has traditionally been the end-of-season event for American sportscar racing, for the last few years it has been part of the “North American Endurance Championship” – something BMW, Ferrari, Ford and Porsche all take part in (alongside Corvette), as well as the occasional trip for a few LMP2 and GTE Am teams/drivers. Whilst Ford have a separate team running their American operation, and even then they nab drivers from the UK side to help, the others all share drivers and other staff in the quest for greater speed, efficiency, and to ‘save’ on costs where at all possible. Having two races on opposite sides of the world does reduce that ability somewhat, as well as almost instantly wiping any value in a separate championship away. Now, with 8 months left to try and find replacement staff and drivers who aren’t committed to teams by now (a job made harder with the first round of the NAEC, the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona, having already been completed), these factory teams who had planned and probably paid for a full season have to re-organise. As you can imagine, they’re not best pleased – let alone the drivers who have been “robbed” of their chance for an American title.

Let’s be realistic here. 10 full season GTE Pro entries and 17 at Le Mans, getting close for a 1/3rd of the grid for the latter, is going to be worth more long-term than a clash to allow one (admittedly a superstar) driver to compete with a team, with all fairness given, isn’t known for finishing in the showpiece event, no matter how close they get. Is the Alonso argument really that important? I understand that for the WEC, it may be a great catch. However, I think it is similar to the Mark Webber situation. Great personality, but that impact/reaction is lessened when part of a team of 3 drivers. Unlike Indycar, Daytona’s Alonso fever was more focused, but much smaller due to this effect. The fever will tail off over the course of 18 months, and for the businesses that have already invested millions on a world stage to market their products to then find the goalposts have been moved to help someone else’s precariously positioned efforts, the return for all parties here is much lower, and much less valuable than it could have been. There’s no point disillusioning the many entries who constantly pay millions each to play for one who might bring 2 million more, but not even continue after the Super Season. However, the choice has been made, we shall just wait and see in the next few days and weeks what happens.

But, for all of the doom and gloom it might be presented, I also want to go on record and say how fantastic the WEC is looking for the next year and a half as well. Whilst we will preview the full season in the weeks to come, 10 LMP1 entries – two Toyotas, two Ginettas for TRS Manor, two AER-engined BR1s for SMP Racing and one Gibson version for DragonSpeed, Rebellion returing with two brand-new R13s with Gibson power and the returning ByKolles Racing Team with a lone CLM P1/01 Nissan shows that, for now, LMP1 lives on! Let’s just hope that these ten can race cleanly, fairly and closely, otherwise it will be a very expensive and short-lived revival. Furthermore, 7 decent LMP2 entries with 3 of the chassis manufacturers represented, and 9 GTE Am entries further prove we’re in a golden age of GT and endurance racing. I hope, for our sake, this decision doesn’t end it…