The FIA released the entry list for the 2023 World Endurance Championship season on Wednesday. The most prestigious hypercar class will feature 13 teams of former Formula 1 drivers, including 1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve.
The reigning Toyota champion fielded two cars. The former is driven by Sebastien Buemi, Brandon Hartley and Rio Haryanto. Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose-Maria Lopez will represent the second crew of the Japanese automaker’s works team.
Last year’s main rivals, Toyota from Alpine, are not represented in the new season, but other factory teams are ready to confront the Japanese. First of all, we are talking about Ferrari, which is returning to the top class of endurance racing this year with the new prototype Ferrari 499P. Antonio Fuoco, Miguel Molina and Niklas Nielsen appear in the first crew, Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado and Antonio Giovinazzi in the second.
The Peugeot factory team also entered two cars. Paul di Resta, Mikkel Jensen and Jean-Eric Vergne will get behind the wheel of the former. The second crew consisted of Loic Duvall, Gustavo Menezes and Nico Muller.
Cadillac Racing will field one car. Earl Bamber, Alex Lynn and Richard Westbrook will play for the USA team. One crew is represented by the Floyd Vanwall team consisting of Tom Diehlmann, Esteban Guerrieri and Jacques Villeneuve.
In 2023, four new Porsche 963 prototypes will be presented simultaneously in the hypercar class, which will be available to three teams. Penske will have two teams with Dane Cameron, Michael Christensen and Frederic Makowiecki, as well as Kevin Estre, André Lotterer and Lawrence Vanthor.
The other two teams that will drive the Porsche 963, Jota and Proton, have each nominated only one driver. Jota is represented by Chinese driver Yifei Ye and Proton by Gianmaria Bruni. So far, one pilot has been appointed by the American Glickenhaus team – Roman Dumas.
The official entry list also includes 11 teams in the LMP2 class and 14 teams in the LMGTE Am class. The 2023 FIA WEC season starts with a prologue on March 11 and 12 and a race on March 17 in Sebring.
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
