Headline: Toyota, McLaren, Aston Martin, Ferrari And Ford Agree On Hypercar Design For Racing Prototypes.
- from a Jalopnik article today
"For the past few months, the top hypercar manufacturers and the FIA have been in talks to decide what the top class of sports car racing will look like at the 24 Hours of Le Mans and beyond. Their conclusion is to have a new level of freedom for hypercar design for LMP1 prototypes."
"In the last year of Porsche vs Toyota, for instance, both cars looked and sounded nearly identical, even down to the paint jobs."
"Everyone knew that something needed to be done or LMP1 would price itself out of existence, and that something was... oddly ambiguous."
"What we got from the FIA today, following one of the international racing regulatory body’s World Motor Sport Council meetings, is annoyingly vague:
A summary of the ongoing discussions regarding the 2020 Technical Regulations for the highest category of FIA WEC was presented as follows:
• Targeted budget of one quarter of current LMP1 budgets.
• Freedom of design for brands based on a ‘Hypercar’ concept."
"Motorsport.com says that this will fall more on the ‘looks’ side than anything else:
The rules, which have the working title of ‘GTP’, will allow for manufacturers to give their prototype machinery the look of one of their road-going sportscars.
The intent of the new rulebook will be to maintain the current level of performance, but at a substantially reduced cost.
There will be a lower level of hybrid technology allowed and it is expected that manufacturers will be able to chose a spec energy-retrieval system rather than developing their own".
-
Leave a comment:
-
TV coverage this year has moved to the Velocity channel for those who are used to it being on Fox Sports. Velocity is supposedly going to show the entire 24 hours too so that's an improvement over Fox Sports' broken-up coverage with some segments not being shown. Feels like the old Speed Channel days again :-)Leave a comment:
-
Interesting footage of the Matra team 1972, the beginning of the post-917 era. That screaming V12. The pit scenes are insane - crowds of photographers and hangers on, out in the road, blocking the cars. The old track with walls close in. Also interesting to see how tedious basic tasks like wheel changing were - carry a tire, hand-thread the nut, get the gun...
Cool to see things like pad changes, damage repair out in the rain...
Cool shots of Cevert and Graham Hill, and sideburns. Great shot of the two Matras coming across the line together.
Leave a comment:
-
1965. Teodoro Zeccoli. Alfa TZ2. Looks like the sand at Arnage to me.
Leave a comment:
-
Now here's some vintage endurance video - 1957 Sebring. No guardrails, no building, no belts or roll bars, just old airport runways. Fangio wins in a Maserati.
Leave a comment:
-
Now that's friggin sweet. Shelby Daytona Coupes are the best Shelby designed cars. If I were to build a kit car it would be a ridiculously fast factory five type 65 coupe. All of that beautiful styling but with a stout aluminum smallblock instead of a cast iron big block.Originally posted by LateFan View PostLeave a comment:
-
Leave a comment:
-
New WEC LMP1 rule revisions announced....
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by LateFan View Post
They gotta do something to bring in more lmp1 cars or the series will die. I can see it already. If they dont so something we will have only blancpain and imsa series. Which makes me wonder what would happen with the 24hr of le mans since WEC currently runs it.Leave a comment:
-
World Endurance Championship may be in trouble... reduced schedule announced....
Leave a comment:
-
"New" Cobra Daytona big blocks
Shelby American will produce a short run of long wheelbase, big block Daytona coupes. I never knew this - this car was supposed to run Le Mans, but the transport truck crashed in France and there was no time to repair it. It did run the next year, but with a small block.
Leave a comment:
Leave a comment: