THE KING RETURNS FOR ITS CROWNS
Porsche’s last absence from the top flight of sportscar racing spanned 15 seasons between 1998 and 2014. Now, it’s returning to the top of the tree once again with an LMDh prototype, just five years after the end of the 919 Hybrid LMP1 World Endurance Championship programme that recrowned the marque as the king of endurance with a Le Mans 24 Hours hat-trick. The reason is simple: a set of regulations that allows it to challenge for outright glory on both the world and North American stages from next season.
Porsche doesn’t want to just add to its record 19 overall victories at Le Mans; just as significantly, it’s looking to increase its tally of 18 wins in its North American equivalent, the Daytona 24 Hours. That’s important for a marque that hasn’t won since 2003 at what next January, as the opening round of the IMSA SportsCar Championship, will be the scheduled debut of the as-yet-unnamed LMDh.
“North America always has been and still is an important market for us,” says new Porsche Motorsport boss Thomas Laudenbach, who last year rejoined a company at which he had previously been its head of powertrains. The naturally aspirated 3.4-litre V8 that powered the RS Spyder LMP2 prototype of the late 2000s was among his babies. “With the same car you can race in the WEC, an FIA championship that includes Le Mans, and in North America, where you
