41 cars will be on track at the European Le Mans Series Official Test, next week at Monza. After intensive testing during the winter, this will be the first public outing of the new Gibson powered LMP2 cars and the Norma LMP3 in Europe.
All but one of the season entries will be present in Monza. The only missing car in the pitlane will be the SMP Racing Dallara. They will be replaced by Slovakian team ARC Bratislava with their Ligier JSP217 which will race in the Le Mans 24 Hours.
Some old an new faces in the European Le Mans Series top class this season, on a grid with 4 Oreca's, 6 Ligiers and 3 Dallara's. Racing Team Nederland with former Le Mans winner Jan Lammers and High Class Racing are both new teams in class, driving the Dallara P217. The third Dallara will be runned by Cetilar Villorba Corse who move up from LMP3 to LMP2. Three more teams are gearing up one class this season: United Autosports and Tockwith Motorsports with a Ligier JSP217 and Graff Racing with 2 Oreca 07's.
The complete LMP3 grid is in the entry list for next week, with the addition of 5 extra cars which will race in the Michelin Le Mans Cup and take the oppportunity for some extra track time. Defending champions United Autosports will arrive in Monza with no less than 4 cars. French team Duqueine Engineering will also bring their third car to Italy. Other teams joining the LMP3 grid are Cool Racing by GPC and Ibran Pardo Javier. All but 2 cars are Ligiers; Oregon Team and M-Racing YMR are both racing in a new Norma M30.
In LMGTE, the complete grid will be at the test in Italy, led by last years champions Beechdean Racing in their Aston Martin Vantage. A second Vantage will be driven by last year's Michelin Le Mans Cup winners TF Sport. Other newcomers to the grid are the Spirit of Race team which will field 2 Ferrari F488 GTE's, run by AF Corse. JMW Motorsport returns with its Ferrari F458 Italia and Proton Competition completes the grid with both of their 911 RSR's. Apart from JMW and Proton, all driver pairings in the GTE class seem to be completed.
Action on the Italian temple of speed will kick off next Tuesday, March 28th at 9 am. There will be 14 hours of tracktime available over two days, including 2 hours of night practice on Tuesday evening.
Click here to download the entry list.
Kristof Vermeulen