Porsche using technology transfer in WEC to the max

Photo (Porsche Motorsport):  Porsche's new LED headlights launched in May 2016 - lightweight, brighter and more efficient than before. 

WEC – the ideal platform for technological pioneers

With its unique efficiency regulations for Class 1 Le Mans prototypes (LMP1), the WEC represents an ideal platform for Porsche – and it was these regulations that fuelled the company's return to elite motorsport in 2014. The regulations provide engineers with an unusual degree of freedom to introduce different drive concepts and require forward-looking technologies such as hybridisation, highly efficient engine downsizing and consistent use of lightweight construction. As a result, the WEC provides the perfect platform for Porsche AG to develop and test innovations for road-going sports cars.

The two LMP1 Porsche 919 Hybrids will once again carry numbers 1 and 2 in this year’s WEC following World Drivers and Manufacturers titles in the 2015 and 2016.

No.1 will be driven by 2016 World Champion Neel Jani of Switzerland, German André Lotterer who is a 3-time Le Mans winner and 2012 World Champion, who has joined the team from Audi, and Briton Nick Tandy, winner at Le Mans in 2015 who moves up from Porsche’s GT programme.

Germany’s Timo Bernhard will be joined at the wheel of the No.2 by two New Zealanders – his fellow 2015 World Champion Brendon Hartley and 2015 Le Mans winner Earl Bamber who, like Tandy, moves up from GT.

The 2017 evolution of the Porsche prototype will be unveiled on March 31 at the Autodromo Nazionale di Monza in Italy just ahead of the WEC’s official pre-season tests, The Prologue, on April 1 and 2.