Is there potential for a privateer effort to run one or two cars in the ILMC, much like what it did with Oreca?

This has been muted, and should prompt the ACO to drastically cut diesel power to stop Audi domination. Thus, the petrols will be competitive, so this may actually be the performance leveler we have been looking for.

Very disappointing, though, hope Anthony Davidson lands a drive and I hope that a privateer effort comes to fruition!!

*WEC, not ILMC

One more thought:

Could it be that we see a repeat of 2009 when Henri was entrusted with a Peugeot? His car has become obsolete and his image and brand would help gather sponsorship. It seems that this would be a perfect fit for Henri and Peugeot. Thoughts?

@William Mound, I agree on the Pescarolo part but I don’t think he has much money ATM, certainly not enough to run a Peugeot! This is sad news as it’s Audi’s to lose now unless Toyota make something incredible!

I disagree. Henri is a hero in France and if Peugeot invests in this, which they already have in the form of developing a 2012 car. Its also easier to raise money of you have a shot at winning with a diesel, and not just a shot at coming eighth. Peugeot’s sponsors may also be available.

lets hope for the best!!

Noooo… Congratulations to Audi for winning the WEC before it starts.
I was really hoping to see another epic battle like last year. Let’s indeed hope that the performance of the remaining teams will be levelled so teams like Pescarolo, Oreca and Rebellion can put up a decent fight.

What horrible news. We finally get a proper world championship and Peugeot pulls out? Very sad.

I echo all of the above sentiments in hoping that they can sell the cars to a decent team otherwise it’ll be a crap year with just the audi’s out in front.

I also hope Anthony Davidson and co get decent drives. It’s funny how the petrol/hybrid cars are beginning to increase in number and performance as the main deisel protagonist leaves.

Porsche are bringing out an LMP car in 2014 too according to Autosport, but thats in the future

Really bad news. After Toyota entering WEC, Honda increasing its efforts and Porsche announcing a comeback for 2014, I was hoping for an increasingly good competition, but now it’s gone. I hope most of the Peugeot works drivers will get a good ride for 2012, although that will be difficult, as most good cockpits are already fixed(seems Alex Wurz has done the right thing, and also Bourdais with his Dragon Indycar contract). Like William Mound, I also hope for a deal with Pescarolo running the 2011 Peugeots, but I doubt that this is possible without any Peugeot technical support. Another possibility would be Colin Kolles: after the HRT F1 team has cancelled the cooperation with him, he has free capacities in his Munich workshop and could run the Peugeots like he did with the Audi R15 back in 2009. Let’s hope that Audi continues despite missing competition.

Several other sources today stated that Peugeot has searched for private teams to continue running the cars, but couldn’t find one, so this hope is probably gone, too. Want to have good news instead today? Watch this:
http://twitpic.com/88q14u

The current new diesel regulations for 2012 severely handicaps the diesels. Perhaps peugeor has done a simulation and seen that they won’t have an advantage.

But really did it is that they didn’t win lemans. All they had to do was to sacrifice 1 car by crashing it into the audi, and they would have had their win. Not even crash it, but just give it a flat.

Had they won, they would have went full steam for 2012.

I think they’re regrouping for 2014. Because toyota and porsche really have a lot of lobbying power. So they want to see what the rules will become.

bamba, they came very close, but if they had done what you suggest I for one would not be sad to see them go

I think they saw the Leaked pics of the Toyota and pulled out because it was just a couple of weeks ago when pagenaud was hired to run Indy car full time, they mentioned in the story the team Simon signed for had negotiated with Peugeot to allow him to race at Sebring and LeMans. So this was very VERY last minute. Also i believe the HPD’s will be more competitive than everyone thinks the car was extremely quick at sebring last year with LeMans aero the new car same body work just with a shark fin added plus a high downforce kit for those non LeMans races.

Sad news, I don’t get how a factory like peugeot doesn’t have the budget to run the program. They have their sponsers + potential new sponser since they won the ilmc again.

to be honest i was looking forward to sebring for audi VS peugeot but now it will we audi n1 vs audi nr 2 vs audi nr 3 ( if they bring a 3th one). Now most will say : “don’t forget toyota” but in all fairness a completly new car can’t compete against an audi r18 fully powered with hybrid system.

If we see no peugeot in lemans 24 hours it will be a dark year for world endurance sportscar.

The more I think about it, the more certain I am that we will see a Peugeot at Sebring. It doesn’t make sense for such a good car not to be used, and raising funds for a potential winner at a bargain price mustn’t be that difficult.

How wealthy is Jaque Nicolet? Perhaps he could do it with the help of some Gulf funds.

MEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRDDDDDEEEEEE!!!!!

WEC was going to be such a boring championship even with both Audi and Peugeot, and now it’s just going to be even worse. I swear I almost cried after hearing the news. The economy sucks.

Alright, you’re all forgetting one thing: The LMP1 privateers cup. The Rebellions, a few Hondas, the Zytet, OAK etc. will all be running in that aswell. There is nothing to say Peugeot won’t be back in 2013, it could well happen. What would be great to see now is that since Toyota wont be in the WEC this year, Audi supplying a private team to run most of the WEC with Audi works team only at select rounds. That way we will have a fair world championship for LMP1, and not Audi racing against no-one.

We’ve seen factory teams withdraw before, most often as a result of some dispute. This, however, is more serious. As the article states, the poor EU economy is the driver of this decision. If Peugeot’s market was the Ferrari, Lambo, MP4 niche, continuation of the program might be an easier sell. Hard to equate directly to mass market commuter cars.

I don’t see a privateer squad as an alternative. The cars are just too complex and technical to hand them over to a non-factory effort, even the best of them, and say “here, have a go”. And if you need to maintain the factory staff and equipment for support, what have you saved/ gained? We have to recognize that the recent privateer efforts mentioned above took place alongside concurrent factory efforts. So factory assistance was never more than a few pit boxes away. I would love to see the Peugeot v. Audi battle continue but I fear it will not.

Now that opens the door for the ACO to give more appreciation to the petrol cars. Especially with the 3 Honda cars at Sebring. Audi itself would probably welcome the competition.

In the end against Peugeot, Audi has won the war then.

Yes, Honda strikes me as the company who will benefit from this most, I easily see them on the podium at Le Mans this year.

‘We’ve seen factory teams withdraw before, most often as a result of some dispute. This, however, is more serious. As the article states, the poor EU economy is the driver of this decision.’

The Euro crisis is a smoke screen, Peugeot haven’t invested in their small car line-up for years which has seen sales drop due to improved competition from everyone from Ford to Toyota to VW to Hyundai.

The German manufactuers and even Renault have shown strong sales, those struggling are the ones who’ve cut investment and therefore have a poor road car line-up and failed to push for sales outside wester Europe.

I am very sad to see Peugeot leave the endurance series, these past years have been an excellent battle between Audi. Hopefully another manufacturer will step up to the plate and challenge the likes of Audi. Would be interesting to see Mercedes or BMW back in the game, especially since both have promising desiel technology and could prove to be tough competition just like they were over a decade ago.