Le Mans Series
2012 European Le Mans Series Calendar Announced
The Le Mans Endurance Organisation has announced the provisional calendar for 2012 today. Five six-hour races have been announced as well as two days of pre-season testing at the Paul Ricard HTTT circuit in March.
Only one out of five race circuits that were part of this year’s Le Mans Series calendar will return in 2012. As in recent years the season will open at the Paul Ricard HTTT circuit with the official test session on March 9th and 10th. Interested teams can run their LMP2, FLM, LM GTE Pro, LM GTE Am and GTC cars during the two days in France.
Three weeks later (March 30th-April 1st) the teams will return to Le Castellet for the season opener, the 6 Hours of Le Castellet. At this moment it is expected that the race will be held on the 5,791m long 1A-V2 configuration, which includes the complete Mistral straight.
In May the series will go to Belgium again, but not to Spa-Francorchamps as the 1000 KM of Spa will be part of the FIA World Endurance Championship in 2012. Instead the teams will travel to the Zolder circuit. It will be interesting to see the LMP2 cars racing on the short and tight 3,977m long circuit between May 18th and 20th.
After the Le Mans break the teams will cross the Channel to race in the United Kingdom. For the first time since 2006 the teams will be racing at Donington again, which replaces the Silverstone round – also part of the FIA World Endurance Championship. The 6 Hours of Donington will take place on July 15th.
No races are scheduled for August and the teams will be back in action on another new circuit, the Brno circuit in the Czech Republic. On 7, 8 and 9 September the beautiful Czech circuit will host the teams for the 6 Hours of Brno.
The season will end in Portugal again, but not on the Estoril circuit. Having already raced in Portimao in 2009 and 2010 the series returns to the Algarve on November 2-4, for what could well be a night race. No decision has been made though.
Even though not officially confirmed yet by LMEO today’s press release also indicates a name change for the series. Instead of being named the Le Mans Series, as it has been since 2006, the only name used is the European Le Mans Series.
Six Le Mans 24 Hours invitations will be awarded to the winners of the categories in the 2012 season.
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I really feel like the World Endurance Championship has robbed the LMS and possibly in the future the ALMS for good events. I can’t see LMP2 cars running at Zolder either.
No Nurburgring! What a shame. It will be nice to see prototypes on the whole mistral straight at Paul Ricard, but it would be better to have LMP1s on the straight…
Decline of a series.
Zolder is a nice track, but for me it has the stigma of the circuit that a series goes to if they can’t go to Spa.
Brno is a good choice, however, as is Donington, and Paul Ricard is a good track. The Algarve should be at the beginning of the season one or two weeks after Sebring, and Nurburgring would be another obvious destination.
I’m afraid this series is going to be completely over shadowed by the new WEC. Personally I can’t see the attraction of going to watch the series without the LMP 1 machines. A pity because there’s an interesting selection of circuits chosen for the races.
Sorry but they put Zolder on the same weekend of Nurburgring 24 hours were factory BMW, Porsche and Audi participate… and theres only 100km between each track.
The LMS at Zolder won’t be a big issue in itself – DTM will be racing at Brands Hatch the same weekend. So that is where most German drivers for BMW and Audi are. Porsche remains to be seen if they have works squads at N24. Problem is too many series on same weekend (again…)
The Zolder race is really misplaced as the GT class will be missing several teams and drivers due to the 24h Nuerburgring at the same weekend, not to mention that there will also be spectators missing. And it’s pity that both Italy (Monza, Imola) and Germany (Nuerburgring) won’t have any prototype race next year.
Donington over Silverstone? Odd choice, in all honesty.
Too many series on the same weekend? Here we go again…
I would go to N24, go to the Zolder race, recored the finish of N24 while at Zolder. All another series, download via torrent or DVR.
Now if you’re talking about seat in the stands, there might be some of what I just mentioned going on.
What else is running?
With the good weather in Europe going from roughly April to Oct, that’s alot of series to squeeze seven months…
@Simon C
Silverstone will be in the WEC, and the FIA is insisting on not having any LMS races part of the WEC and vise-verse