Porsche will return to the Le Mans 24 Hours with a full factory LMP1 prototype in 2014, the Stuttgart-based sportscar manufacturer has announced.


As the event's most successful manufacturer, the company has not been represented in a works capacity in the top class at Le Mans since 1998 when Porsche claimed the last of its 16 outright victories with Allan McNish, Stephane Ortelli and Laurent Aiello in the 911 GT1.

It has retained a strong presence in the GT class since then, however.

President of the Executive Board at Porsche AG, Matthias Muller, said the company had always intended to return to Le Mans as a factory team and had been waiting for the right time to announce its intentions.

"Motorsport was always an essential part of the Porsche brand," said Müller. "So for us it was only a matter of time before we returned as a factory to the top league of racing.

"Porsche's successes in Le Mans are unrivalled. We want to follow up on this with the 17th outright victory."

Porsche's last factory involvement in the prototype class was its successful American Le Mans Series-winning LMP2 RS Spyder - which was run and developed by Penske.

The company has not released details on the new project, or whether it will be a coupe or an open roof car, but indicated that it wanted to make the most of the Automobile Club de l'Ouest's inticing approach to green technologies.

Hartmut Kristen, Head of Porsche Motorsport, said: "We're looking forward to the task of developing new technologies and to continue on with the success of the Porsche RS Spyder. After the conclusion of our works-supported sports prototype programme in the American Le Mans Series we have kept up with the latest technological advances.

"Now we will begin with detailed research in order to evaluate the various concept alternatives for our new car.

"These obviously depend on how the regulations for the year 2014 look in detail. In principle, these regulations are interesting for us because the integration of our hybrid technology in the vehicle concept is one possible option."

Porsche indicated that it could use the new project to highlight new technologies as it did recently with the 911 GT3 R Hybrid, which raced in the recent Nurburgring 24 Hours with the flywheel KERS system developed by Williams.

"With the RS Spyder we proved that our motorsport engineers in Weissach are at the forefront," said Wolfgang Hatz, Board Member for Research and Development at Porsche AG. "For instance, we were the first to run a high-revving race engine with direct fuel injection, DFI, setting new standards in performance and efficiency.

"Recently, with the 911 GT3 R Hybrid, we adopted a completely new drive technology for racing purposes and achieved a considerable reduction in consumption."

Porsche's run of victories at Le Mans began in 1970 with Richard Attwood and Hans Herrmann in the fabled 917. The French track then witnessed the marque dominate through the 1980s, with a consecutive wins from '81 - '87, the last six of those with the 956/962 derivatives.

The new Porsche LMP1 sports prototype, which will compete in the sports car World Endurance Championship (WEC) and in the 24 Hours of Le Mans from 2014, successfully completed its first rollout today on the Porsche test track in Weissach. Before the eyes of the entire Board of Porsche AG, Porsche works driver Timo Bernhard took his new ‘wheels’ through its initial function check.

The LMP1 racer turned its first laps on the circuit several weeks earlier than originally planned. “We are well on schedule,” says Fritz Enzinger, Head of LMP1. “Our newly formed team has worked with utmost concentration on getting this highly complex vehicle on the track as soon as possible. This allows us a few additional weeks for more testing and further development. From 2014, the regulations are primarily based on efficiency. This makes the competition amongst engineers more interesting and presents us with completely new challenges.”

Since the decision in mid-2011 to return with the LMP1 racer to top motorsport as a works effort, the Motorsport Centre at Weissach has grown significantly. A workshop and an administration building were built and accommodate around 200 employees who are responsible for the design, assembly and deployment of the LMP1 car. From the 2014 season, the racer will be fielded by a Weissach-based works squad.

“I was involved in the development of the new car right from the outset,” says Porsche works driver Timo Bernhard. “I’m very proud that I was the one to take our baby through its first paces today. Already now the car feels great. I look forward to testing the vehicle in the coming weeks and months with my friend and colleague Romain Dumas.” Bernhard (32) and Dumas (35) are the first two regular drivers in the LMP1 project and will carry out the majority of testing on various international circuits.

“During the development of our new LMP1 vehicle, we faced the same challenge as in the series production development of our road legal cars,” says Wolfgang Hatz, Board Member for Research and Development at Porsche AG. “Our aim was to achieve the best possible efficiency without compromising performance.”

Matthias Müller, Chairman of the Executive Board at Porsche AG, particularly emphasises the benefits customers will enjoy from the development of the high-tech race car. “The engineers were able to start with a blank sheet of paper in the design of the new LMP1 car that was out here today on the Weissach race track for the first time. Hence, they were able to apply many new technologies within the framework of the regulations that will also benefit the customers of our road legal automobiles in the future. After all, there’s a race car in every Porsche.”

Porsche has been outspoken in its criticism of the ultrasonic fuel flow meter used in Formula 1. The German marque will use the meter in its new 919 LMP1 this year. In the LMP1 category gasoline fuelled cars must run with two sensors identical to the units at the heart of Red Bull’s disqualification from the Australian Grand Prix. Cars running on diesel fuel must run three, but Porsche says that there is ‘no robust solution’ to the measuring process and doubts that there will be this season.

‘It hasn’t held us back because we did not make our development dependent on it, but there is still no robust solution in place,’ said Alex Hitzinger, Technical Director of LMP1 development at Porsche. ‘The FIA is still very hopeful that the latest spec will work and will be reliable, but that is not proven yet. We optimise how they are mounted to give them the easiest possible life, but right now we don’t know if it is all going to be robust. We should know at the end of March.’

The steering wheel in your basic race car is just that; it's a simple, lightweight, possibly suede-covered instrument used to tell the front wheels of the vehicle where to go. As you advance up the race car ladder, however, a steering wheel begins to be much more than a simple directional tool. It will start to become covered in buttons, switches, wear paddles, and contain levers. It can be used to control speed in pit lane, signal directions back to the team, change braking pressure, and increase or decrease traction control, amongst other things. The steering wheel of the Porsche 919 Hybrid LMP1 car is such a tiller, and it's just as complicated as you might think.

The design of this "wheel" is not round. It's more closely related to something you might find in the cabin of a spaceship, and takes on the shape of an airplane's yoke. This shape helps with entry and exit for all of the teams drivers, as there are some tall folks on the crew, and then can more easily get their leg in and out of the underside of the wheel. The button placements were designed in cooperation with the drivers to find the ideal placements for each item.

Two of the most commonly pressed buttons are the ones placed right where the thumbs can easily reach them. These are the blank red button on the left and the blank blue button on the right. The red one activates the boost function, which is created using the stored electrical energy from the battery. A press of the blue button flashes the headlights, which is pretty important as the LMP1 cars are the fastest on the track and need to alert the slower traffic that they are rapidly approaching.

Starting at the top of the colored array of labeled buttons, you have a set yellow, blue, and pink buttons. These control the traction control to the front axle, traction control to the rear axle, and the brake force distribution between the two axles. The green RAD button is used to operate the radio, while the green OK button relays that a requested setting change has been performed. DRINK, labeled in orange, does just that, as in it gives the driver a drink from the onboard system. The other orange button with the N puts the car in neutral. The red PIT button restricts the 919 Hybrids speed to the max allowed on pit lane, and the other red WASH button turns on the windscreen washer.

In the middle are a handful of rotary knobs, and they all have to do with a variety of braking, traction, hybrid management, and fuel and engine management strategies. That screen above the rotary knobs is used to display relevant information to the driver, such as speed, which gear is engaged, and a handful of other helpful bits of information.

The wheel itself is constructed from carbon fiber, and all of its various buttons and knobs can be viewed in the dark with relative ease. A black light sit above the drivers head, and the colored displays respond in a manner that works well in nighttime driving. That's pretty important when you're ripping down the Mulsanne straight attempting to win the

Porsche has been away from the Le Mans raceway for the last 16 years. The German automaker is finally heading back this year. In order to be competitive you have to also be efficient, and to do that you need to run with a hybrid powertrain. That's where the all-new 2015 version of the 919 Hybrid race car comes in, and it's nearly set to make its racing debut this spring.

The Porsche team are currently in Dubai to undergo extensive testing at the Yas Marina Circuit. There are a number of tests for the team before it heads to the UK for the April 12 WEC season opening race. That takes place at Silverstone, where we'll see Porsche battling for endurance supremacy against the likes of Audi and Toyota.

To power its entry, Porsche has employed the use of a turbocharged 2.0-liter V-4 engine that works in concert with an electric drive system and two KERS bits. The gasoline engine powers the rear wheels while the electric drive moves the fronts. That little four banger is good for around 500 horsepower, and the electric components will no doubt meter out plenty more juice.

Keep your eyes on your calendar because April 12th will be here faster than you know. Hopefully, for Porsche, its 919 Hybrid will be faster than the competition.