Five Entries Withdrawn from LM24

Photo: John Dagys

There’s been a significant shakeup in the entry list for this year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, with the ACO confirming Monday the withdrawal of five cars for the twice-around-the-clock French endurance classic.

Both Millennium Racing Oreca 03 Nissans, as well as two Aston Martin Racing entries and an additional Aston Martin Vantage V8 from Craft Racing will not take part in the race on June 14-15.

ENTRY LIST: 24 Hours of Le Mans

As a result, the remaining five entries on the reserve list have been given confirmed positions on the grid.

The No. 50 Larbre Competition Morgan-Judd, No. 76 IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, No. 79 ProSpeed Competition Porsche, as well as the Caterham-badged No. 42 Greaves Motorsport Zytek Z11SN Nissan and the No. 29 Pegasus Racing Morgan-Nissan are now all in the race.

No additional reserve entries are left on the list, meaning any additional withdrawals would result in a starting grid of less than 56 cars.

Aston Martin Racing’s initial six-car entry has been trimmed down to its four FIA World Endurance Championship season-long entries only, with the No. 89 GTE-Pro and No. 96 GTE-Am entries having been withdrawn.

“We were, earlier this year, given six places on the grid by the ACO,” confirmed AMR team principal John Gaw. “However, after careful consideration, we decided that we want to focus our concentration on coming away with the best possible results for our four works cars.”

Craft Racing’s No. 87 Vantage, meanwhile, will also not take part, with the entry having been awarded to the team for its runner-up finish in the Asian Le Mans Series last year.

The biggest implication, however, comes with the two Millennium entries in LMP2, which were previously forced out of the opening two FIA WEC rounds due to funding delivery issues.

With the UAE-backed effort, run by Britain’s Delta Motorsport, now not participating in the double-points scoring Le Mans round, there are now serious questions over the program’s future.

Additionally, the ACO released Monday the entry list for the Le Mans Test Day on June 1, which also sees 56 cars but with the absence of the No. 79 ProSpeed Porsche and an additional AF Corse Ferrari F458 Italia for Duncan Cameron.

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John