CrowdStrike, Kessel Secure 24H Le Mans Auto-Invites

CrowdStrike Racing by APR and Kessel Racing have secured the final automatic invites for this year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans courtesy of their Asian Le Mans Series title success.

The two teams wrapped up the respective titles in the LMP2 and GT classes in Sunday’s 4 Hours of Abu Dhabi season finale at Yas Marina to secure their place on the starting grid for the FIA World Endurance Championship blue riband event in June.

CrowdStrike trio George Kurtz, Malthe Jakobsen and Louis Deletraz pulled clear from their nearest rivals from Cetilar Racing with victory in Saturday’s opener, their third of the season, before sealing the title with an eighth place finish on Sunday.

It adds to CrowdStrike’s LMP2 success in the Rolex 24 at Daytona last month and likely ensures FIA Bronze-rated Kurtz will make his fourth Le Mans start.

Kessel, meanwhile, wrapped up the GT title with Dustin Blattner, Chris Lulham and Dennis Marschall, who took their Ferrari 296 GT3 to third in Saturday’s opener and ninth on Sunday, having previously taken victories in the preceding rounds at Sepang and Dubai.

It gives the Swiss team a second auto-invite to add to the one it picked up with its success in the GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Bronze Cup.

Following the conclusion of the Asian Le Mans season, the only auto-invite that remains still to be officially confirmed is the ‘at large’ Hypercar entry that is awarded at the discretion of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

This traditionally goes to the previous year’s GTP title-winner, but with Porsche Penske Motorsport ineligible to participate at Le Mans owing to Porsche’s exit from the top class of the WEC, Sportscar365 understands the invitation is instead to be given to a team selected by Cadillac, expected to be Wayne Taylor Racing.

The remaining IMSA auto-invites are already confirmed to be going to PJ Hyett (Jim Trueman Award) and Orey Fidani (Bob Akin Award).

Additionally, five auto-invites were assigned at the conclusion of the European Le Mans Series last October, which went to Panis Racing, Inter Europol Competition, AO by TF and CLX Motorsport (all LMP2) as well as TF Sport (LMGT3).