Jensen Confirmed as BMW Reserve Driver

Former European F3 ace Mikkel Jensen has been confirmed as BMW’s reserve driver for the 2018/19 FIA World Endurance Championship season.

The 23-year-old Dane will travel to Motorland Aragon this week to turn his first laps behind the wheel of the new BMW M8 GTE, which is being run by the MTEK squad in the GTE-Pro class.

He will be joined in Spain by full-time WEC drivers Augusto Farfus, Philipp Eng and Martin Tomczyk for the car’s final private rollout before the official pre-season Prologue test at Paul Ricard on April 6-7.

A BMW statement said the endurance test would provide Jensen with a “good opportunity to familiarize himself with how things work at the racetrack.”

Jensen signed with BMW as a factory junior last March after two years in Euro F3, being placed in the company’s affiliated Walkenhorst Motorsport lineup for the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup.

He also contested the European Le Mans Series with LMP3 outfit AT Racing, winning the Four Hours of Spa and claiming three pole positions.

To mark the confirmation of his new role, Jensen tweeted: “Delighted to announce that I will be test and reserve driver for BMW Motorsport in the FIA WEC super season. What a beast the BMW M8 GTE is!”

Jensen will be on standby to fill in for any of the full-season BMW drivers during the WEC campaign should the need arise.

BMW recently confirmed fellow Junior Colton Herta to serve as a test and reserve driver for BMW Team RLL’s campaign in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

The pair of MTEK-run entries in the WEC will be co-driven by Eng/Tomczyk/Nicky Catsburg (No. 81) and Farfus/Antonio Felix da Costa/Alexander Sims (No. 82).