Nicolas maduro

Listen to this article The 38-year-old has been a mainstay of the WEC since the series’ inception, initially as a Toyota driver in the top LMP1 class until he was dropped by the marque in mid-2014. After a limited programme with the KCMG LMP2 team in 2015, which included his first Le Mans 24 Hours class win, Lapierre joined the Signatech-run Alpine outfit in 2016 and has raced there since, barring the 2019-20 campaign when he spearheaded Cool Racing’s line-up. In 2021, Lapierre became a director of Cool Racing, in which he had previously been a shareholder, and for 2023 he will devote more of his time to running the Swiss outfit as he takes a year off from racing in the WEC. He hopes to return in 2024 to drive Alpine’s new Oreca-derived LMDh prototype, which is expected to begin track testing later this year. “This year I have a lot to do with my team Cool Racing, we are doing two LMP2 cars in ELMS and we hope to run two cars at Le Mans as well,” Lapierre told … [Read more...] about Lapierre to skip 2023 WEC season as Alpine steps down to LMP2

Listen to this article The Signatech run-Alpine team will run two rebadged Oreca 07-Gibson cars in the LMP2 class of the WEC this year, a transition season for the team before it returns to the Hypercar category in 2024 with an LMDh contender. Matthieu Vaxiviere and Andre Negrao, who raced for the team with a grandfathered LMP1 car alongside Nicolas Lapierre in 2021-22, have both been retained by the team and will be split across its two LMP2 entries. Vaxiviere will team up with two-time LMP2 champion Julien Canal and ex-Richard Mille Racing driver Charles Milesi in the #36 Alpine A470, while Negrao will join double European Le Mans Series title winner Memo Rojas and Olli Caldwell in the sister #35 entry. Milesi was effectively a part of the Signatech set-up last year when the French operation ran the Richard Mille team, while Caldwell is an Alpine Academy member who also got to sample a rebadged Oreca 07 at the Bahrain rookie test last year. Canal and Rojas are … [Read more...] about Alpine announces full driver line-up for two-car WEC LMP2 attack