WEC
Find the latest news from the World Endurance Championship.
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The European Le Mans Series features the elite of European Endurance racing and all the LMP2 or LMGTE drivers that hope one day to compete in the FIA WEC, the endurance world championship. As part of its partnership with the ACO, TotalEnergies is official fuel supplier and the company also provides support to the Cool Racing and Panis Racing teams, through its brand Elf.
Major partnership with Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO)
Through this strategic partnership with the ACO, the company is building on its longstanding commitment to endurance racing. Like an open-air test lab, the track represents a key source of innovation, because the intensive demands of endurance racing – long race times and distances – push us to develop increasingly high-performance fuels that will one day be available to motorists.
The ACO has recently redefined the rules for the WEC, introducing stricter constraints for the Hypercar category. Now, the objective is to achieve the best performance while minimising fuel consumption. This revolution reflects the current concerns of both manufacturers and motorists: consuming less and reducing their environmental footprint.
To meet these requirements, and following the Excellium Endurance which contained 10% ethanol from renewable sources (plant waste) and 5% of bio-hydrocarbons, our engineers have created after several months of research and testing, a formula that no longer contains a single drop of petrol: Excellium racing 100.
Excellium Racing 100 emerged from this drive to combine performance and efficiency. This fuel from 100% certified* sustainable fuel sources has made its debut in March 2022, in the season opener of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), the 1,000 Miles of Sebring. Designed and manufactured by TotalEnergies, Excellium Racing 100 is made from bioethanol, itself produced from waste from French vineyards.
Due to its 100% natural origin, Excellium Racing 100 will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars on the track by at least 65%**.
Excellium Racing 100 is a true innovation made possible by our engineers’ expertise, and ties into the common values that the company shares with the FIA, namely safety, hybridisation, reduced consumption, low-carbon mobility, etc. As partner and official fuel supplier to the ACO (Automobile Club de l’Ouest), TotalEnergies is again proving its pioneering spirit and quest for performance.
This new fuel, approved by all our stakeholders thanks to the testing phases and discussions with constructors and legislators (FIA, ACO), is now supplied to all competitors in the FIA WEC, including for the 24 Hours of Le Mans and European Le Mans Series.
ELF and the pyramid of young talent in endurance
Already extensively involved in Endurance racing – a category widely acknowledged as an excellent test lab for the fuels of the future – TotalEnergies added a new string to its bow in 2020 when the company agreed a partnership between the Elf brand and the Cool Racing Team as part of the European Le Mans Series. Once again this year, on its fifth season in the category, the team will be keen to do well and will be aiming to win the title in the LMP2 championship with its Oreca 07 prototype.
It will be able to count on the support of the team, headed by Pechito Lopez, whose talent and experience are beyond question. The Argentinian will head a team of drivers that also includes Vladislav Lomko and Reshad De Gerus. The team will be also involved in LMP2 Pro/Am with his owner Nicolas Lapierre, who has collaborated successfully for years with TotalEnergies, and Alexandre Coigny and Malthe Jakobsen.
The Swiss team will also features on the LMP3 and Michelin Le Mans Cup grids. More importantly, it will compete for a one-off in FIA WEC at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with two LMP2 prototypes driven respectively by Lapierre-Coigny-Jakobsen and Lomko, De Gerus and Simon Pagenaud, the 500 Miles of Indianapolis 2019 winner.
Once again this year, the Elf brand will also feature on Panis Racing’s Oreca 07 prototype. This season will be the team’s eight appearance in the European Le Mans Series, a category where it has long since established a fine reputation. You only need to look at its result at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2020 & 2021, the pinnacle of Endurance racing, where it claimed a superb third place in the LMP2 class.
As it aims to keep improving in the European Le Mans series, where it finished runner up in 2022, Olivier Panis, Sarah and Simon Abadie’s team will be looking to win this year and has therefore put together a strong crew, with Dutchmen Job Van Uitert (24 years old), Tijmen Van Der Helm (19 years old) and Venezuelan Manuel Maldonado (23 years old).
*Excellium Racing 100 is a certified 100% sustainable product according to the mass balance system applied by a voluntary certification organisation approved by the European Union
**In line with the methodology provided by the European RED II directive (2018/2001), Excellium Racing 100 can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 65% compared to its fossil equivalent.
