On May 19th 2015 The ACO told us that the grandstands are sold out for test day proving yet again how popular the Le Mans 24hrs has become. A day spent at testing is a much more relaxed and informative day for spectators with far fewer people around and plenty to see.
For the main event there are 56 pit garages or boxes but for testing The ACO allow 65 cars to come along . As a result various teams will be sharing pit garages.
An interesting addition to the invited cars this year will be the new LMP3 category machines. They will be testing but will not be competing in the actual 24hrs of Le Mans. They are coming along to see how they perform on the full circuit in preparation for LMP3 possibly becoming a recognised class in the future. There will be two Juno Ginettas and two LNT Ginetta Nissans.
There are five main race 'reserves' who are permitted to test. These are #49 KCMG Oreca -03 Judd, #60 Formula Racing Ferrari 458 Italia, #86 Gulf Racing UK Porsche 911RSR, #65 Proton Competition Porsche 911RSR and #44 Ibanez Oreca 03R Nissan.
This brings the total number of cars invited by the ACO to come testing to 65.
It is interesting to see on the entry list that are the three Nissan LMP1 which will hopefully be out in earnest but whether they will be 'fully hybrid' is under discussion! There was some dispute over certain aspects of their system. Also things have been very quiet around the popular Rebellion Team and their pair of Rebellion R-One AER cars,