Jani Believes Proton’s Progress Hidden by “Slower” Porsche

Neel Jani believes Proton Competition has been doing a better job than last year in the FIA World Endurance Championship, but that the privateer Porsche team’s progress has been obscured by the 963’s general competitive struggles.

The No. 99 Porsche 963 that Jani shares with Nico Pino and Nico Varrone has endured a difficult start to 2025, with a best finish of 14th from the opening three rounds of the campaign at Imola, and retiring early on with a powertrain issue this month at Spa.

It comes against the backdrop of a tough season in general for the Porsche camp, with the Penske-run factory 963s having only scored a best finish of eighth.

With Proton having shone last year at Spa, where he and Julien Andlauer finished fifth in a race they led at points, Jani believes that the overall struggles of Porsche mean that Proton has been unable to demonstrate the progress it has made since 2024.

However, the Swiss veteran thinks that the experience Proton gained from its first 24 Hours of Le Mans with the 963 should put the team in a better position to perform in the blue riband event, in which it finished 45th overall last year amid myriad issues.

“Last year we went to Le Mans with a good feeling after Spa, where we led the most laps and had Proton’s best race so far in its LMDh history, I would say,” Jani told Sportscar365.

“I think we had decent pace at certain stages at Le Mans, but we didn’t have it all the way through. That’s the tough thing for a small team, to be quick when it really counts.

“But for this year’s Le Mans we’ll have more experience, last year we had a steep learning curve, and I do think we saw some things last year. We lacked top speed and I think we know why now, relating to car prep. Hopefully we are better on that this year.

“And then it’s just understanding the car in the day, in the night, with the different tire compounds. That was the biggest thing we learned.

“I think overall we are better than last year, but you just can’t see it because in general the Porsche is slower. The Penske cars only scored six points [prior to Spa]. So we can’t show how much we improved compared to last year.

“But I think we have closed the gap to Penske. Let’s hope at Le Mans that the Porsches are a bit quicker!”

On where Proton is still lacking in relation to the works Porsches, Jani said that tire degradation remains an issue, made harder by the team’s lack of testing.

“In Qatar and Imola, we were there on fastest lap times, but we were struggling on second stints, when the degradation kicks in; that’s where you see a difference [to the factory Porsches],” he explained.

“That’s also our biggest working area because in free practice you don’t get long enough to drive. We have to learn things regarding degradation during the races.

“That’s our main thing to work on. But the fact that Le Mans is a low-degradation track should help us normally.”

Jani added he is enjoying working with engineers Brice Laforge and Jeromy Moore — with whom he also worked on the Porsche LMP1 project — to try and make the absolute most out of Proton’s limited track time to try and improve the car.

“We are ‘weekend warriors’ in the sense we never test, we don’t do simulator work, so we need to be super-efficient in finding the set-up direction,” said Jani.

“We have to be so precise with the discussion with the engineers, what areas to focus on improving and what not to focus on, and I enjoy this challenge.

“For sure it helps the engineers have stayed consistent. We understand each other and we trust each other. They know if I say this or that, then we go in that direction, and that makes the whole thing more efficient because it’s already a complicated car.”