The push to prevent teams in the World Endurance Championship’s Hypercar class running two-driver line-ups from next season appears to have failed.
A proposal to that effect put forward by the WRT BMW squad has not met with favour from the other participants and is likely to be abandoned.
The calls were led by WRT boss Vincent Vosse in reaction to Cadillac’s decision to run only two drivers in the six-hour races this year, but he has conceded that the status quo allowing teams and manufacturers to decide whether to run two or three is likely to be maintained.
It is understood that there will be no change in the sporting rules without the unanimous support of the teams.
“I would be surprised if there is a change,” Vosse told Motorsport.com. “It seems that most of the manufacturers are against imposing a new rule.”
The complications of mandating three-driver line-ups and the raft of rule changes it would require explains why the majority appear to be against a shift.
At the moment there are no drive-time regulations in Hypercar and there is also no provision for a team to nominate a reserve on a race weekend, even at the Le Mans 24 Hours.
#2 Cadillac Racing Cadillac V-Series.R: Earl Bamber, Alex Lynn
Photo by: Andreas Beil
Porsche Penske Motorsport managing director Jonathan Diuguid said: “It would create a lot of complexity in the regulations.
“We carry a spare driver at some races but not every one. Right now if one of our drivers got sick we could make it through the weekend [with two].
“If we start enforcing three drivers it will start causing problems, particularly with event conflicts where we can’t have a spare driver.
“Also these are complicated cars to drive, so you don’t want to be putting in drivers who are under-prepared.
“I don’t like to throw around the S-word — safety — but this is probably something that falls into that category.”
Peugeot Sport technical director Olivier Jansonnie presented a similar argument for keeping the regulations as they are, pointing out that the French manufacturer ran only two drivers in each of its cars at Spa in May when Jean-Eric Vergne and Stoffel Vandoorne were on Formula E duty in Berlin.
“The solution we found in Spa was a good compromise and we would like to keep the regulations the same,” he explained.
“If you have three drivers and something happens to one you can always do the race with just two. We are pushing to keep the rules as they are.”
#94 Peugeot Totalenergies Peugeot 9X8: Paul Di Resta, Loic Duval
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Batti Pregliasco, team manager of the factory AF Corse team, also said that the rules “should be kept as they are”.
Also on the table is a second proposal aligned to the one concerning two and three drivers.
This would involve preventing teams and manufacturers from changing drivers over the course of the season, which could have a serious impact on those with drivers also competing in the FE world championship.
“It is important to leave the door open,” said Pregliasco. “We are happy with our six drivers, but I understand that a manufacturer might want to bring in a name driver for Le Mans. Or perhaps a driver might lose performance over the season.”
Vosse argued that it should be mandated in the rules whether a team runs two or three drivers in the shorter WEC races because using two offers a clear benefit in those events.
“Two drivers clearly offers an advantage in terms of track time and team strategy, but we choose to run three because that is how many drivers you need for the Le Mans 24 Hours, the biggest race of the year,” he told Motorsport.com in July.
“I would like it to be clear in the rules how many drivers you have to run, whether that is two or three.”