“As many cars as we can”, Cadillac plans to run in the hypercar class at the 100th edition of the 24h Le Mans: This suggests three V-LMDh
Cadillac is planning a big line-up for the 100th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans on 10-11 June 2023. The General Motors luxury brand apparently plans to field three of its brand new LMDh prototypes.
The announcement was made as part of General Motors’ unveiling of its racing programme for the 2023 season, and while Laura Klauser, who heads up the programme, did not give a specific number of Cadillac V-LMDh cars planned for Le Mans, she did say that the intention was to field “as many cars as we can”.
This suggests that in addition to the one Cadillac LMDh running in the full 2023 WEC season, the two sister cars running in the full 2023 IMSA season will also be brought to Le Mans.
Cadillac’s entry teams in the first year of the LMDh regulations are Chip Ganassi Racing and Action Express Racing. Ganassi will field one of the Cadillac V-LMDh cars on a full-time basis in each of IMSA’s GTP class and WEC’s Hypercar class in 2023. Action Express will field such a car on a full-time basis in IMSA’s GTP class. Cadillac regular drivers have already been confirmed for both IMSA and WEC.
The fact that Laura Klauser does not yet want to be specific about three cars in her comments on the 24h Le Mans 2023 is explained by the tradition that the organiser of the legendary race maintains: “To come to Le Mans, you have to be invited by the ACO.”
“If you enter a car in the whole [WEC] season, you are guaranteed Le Mans because this race is part of the season. That means we will have at least one car on the grid [at Le Mans]. For everything else, it’s still a case of waiting, communicating and working together. It depends on what the ACO says,” Klauser said.
The test programme of the Cadillac V-LMDh, which was shown for the first time on 9 June, was started in July. Since then, 11,000 kilometres have already been covered with two cars.
The race debut will be on 28/29 January 2023 at the IMSA season opener, the 24 Hours of Daytona. Three cars are planned there – two from Ganassi and one from Action Express. An explicit invitation, as required for Le Mans, is not necessary for Daytona.
In order to prepare for the 24 Hours of Daytona and the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which will take place a good four months later, Cadillac would, according to Klauser, like to “carry out a 24-hour test before the turn of the year, because you simply learn the most during such tests.
