IMSA LMP2 Champ Farano to Take Up Le Mans Auto Invite

Newly crowned IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship LMP2 champion John Farano plans to contest next year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, having secured an automatic invitation by winning the Jim Trueman Award.

Farano teamed with Louis Deletraz and Rui Andrade to win the LMP2 class in Saturday’s season-ending Motul Petit Le Mans, which led him to the LMP2 title in the process.

As the highest-ranked Bronze-rated driver in LMP2, Farano also beat Era Motorsport’s Dwight Merriman to the Trueman Award and the attached Le Mans auto-invite.

Speaking post-race, Farano confirmed intentions to take up the invite and compete at Le Mans’ centenary edition next June.

“I’ve already got a car on order,” Farano said. “I’ll be representing IMSA at Le Mans.”

The Canadian driver indicated that his Le Mans entry will be run by a combination of Ricky Capone-led Tower crew, while also receiving support from an unnamed European team.

“It’s going to be combination of people,” Farano explained. “We’ve got European connections as well that’ll give us some support.

“But we’ll be taking many of our team members from here as well. So it will be a combined effort.”

Farano succeeds Ben Keating as the recipient of the Trueman Award. He finished behind the Texan in the award standings last year.

Previous winners include Misha Goikhberg, Cameron Cassels and Patrick Kelly, with the latter having taken up the Le Mans auto invite for the 2021 edition of the race.

Farano has previous history racing in Europe. He previously contested multiple seasons in the Michelin Le Mans Cup and raced in the European Le Mans Series in both LMP2 and LMP3, securing the championship in the latter.

His one previous start at Le Mans came with RLR MSport, teaming with Arjun Maini and Norman Nato.

“I did Le Mans in 2019 in an LMP2 car and did Road to Le Mans before that,” Farano recalled. “In 2019 it was the first time there, just taking it all in. [I’m] lucky to have done it before COVID because there was a lot of fans and the whole spectacle of it.

“Going back this [time,] certainly we have some goals: being on the podium in the Pro-Am category.”

In addition to his Le Mans entry, Farano also confirmed that Tower will return to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship next year, although Deletraz will not be part of the driving squad.

“Absolutely,” he said. “We’ll be back in the championship in 2023.”

Ryan Hardwick, meanwhile, has become the recipient of the Bob Akin Award, which also awards an invite to the French endurance classic.

Hardwick previously told Sportscar365 he plans to take part in the race next year as well, likely affiliated with a Porsche customer team in GTE-Am.