WEC: Kubica still dreams of winning Le Mans

Robert Kubica still dreams of winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans, having so far finished second twice in the LMP2 class at the legendary circuit. In 2022, he took 2nd place in this category together with his teammates from the Prema team, and the following year he repeated the result, but already drove a sports prototype of the Belgian team WRT.

In 2024, Robert competed in the top class of the WEC, driving the Ferrari 499P hypercar of the private team AF Corse; his partners were Robert Schwartzman and the Chinese Yifei Ye, and together they won the 6-hour race in Austin, but they did not reach the finish at Le Mans.

Although it has not yet been officially confirmed, it appears that Kubica will remain with the team in 2025, although the composition of the #83 crew will change slightly: Schwartzman, who will continue his career in IndyCar, will be replaced by the Brit Phil Hanson, an experienced endurance racing professional.

Antonio Coletta, head of the Ferrari factory program in the WEC, said at the season finale in Bahrain that they were interested in continuing the partnership with Kubica, but the Pole himself made it clear that he was ready to stay with AF Corse.

“When I chose AF 12 months ago, I was initially sure that I would spend several seasons with this team,” Robert told Sportcar365.com. – It makes no sense for me to change anything. But, as often happens in motorsport, a number of circumstances must arise for this to happen. However, both parties are positive and I hope that it will soon become clear whether we can continue the collaboration or not.

This year at Le Mans we didn’t have the chance to compete with the factory teams. I still think we had the pace, but to succeed you have to stay on the track until the last hour of the marathon, or even fight until the last lap.

My first Le Mans experience in 2021 has taught me that you can take the lead on the last lap and still miss out on victory. I still believe that the factory teams and their drivers have a better chance of winning. If I was betting on someone to win, I’d go with the factory car. Although this does not mean that if I stay with our team next year, we will not have a chance to repeat what we did this year, but we will get a better result.”

Kubica means that for more than 20 hours of the race his team was almost consistently in front and could easily be counted among the favorites, but unfortunately it all ended in a retirement due to technical reasons.

“At the end of the day, when I was choosing what to do this year, winning Le Mans was my priority,” Robert continued. – Of course it is nice if you do not perform well on all circuits, but during the season we have seen that it is very difficult to be competitive everywhere. At Le Mans I would like to drive the best car possible, and today that would probably be our #83 hypercar.

I must admit that I have already had discussions with other teams, but I think my best chance at Le Mans is to drive car No. 83.”