Walkenhorst Gearing Up for Le Mans, GTE Debut With Ferrari

Experienced BMW team Walkenhorst Motorsport is “motivated” for its 24 Hours of Le Mans debut despite facing the significant challenge of getting acquainted with a new type of car as well as the GTE platform.

The German squad, which won the 24 Hours of Spa with BMW in 2018, is running a Ferrari 488 GTE Evo in GTE-Am, marking a departure from its usual GT3 territory.

Walkenhorst earned an automatic invitation to the 100th-anniversary edition of the French enduro by winning the Asian Le Mans Series class title in February with a BMW M4 GT3.

However, to race in GTE-Am, it needed to source a different car. Managing director Niclas Koenigbauer said that the vehicle options were limited in the final year of the class, which is being replaced by LMGT3 next year.

Walkenhorst ended up reaching a deal with AF Corse to rent a Ferrari 488 GTE Evo for the race on June 10-11.

“There are not so many options,” Koenigbauer told Sportscar365.

“There is Ferrari, Porsche and Aston Martin. The BMW… I don’t know if we could run it but don’t think there was an option and they are not active [in GTE] anymore. Ford is the same scenario, more or less.

“So basically, there are three customer-spec GTE cars. It is the last year of GTE, so what is the perspective? The perspective is that if you want a collector car, it’s great. But then you maybe don’t need all the spare parts.

“For us, it was important to understand what sort of surrounding packages are available and make the most sense. We then decided to go the Ferrari way.

“We decided to go with the Ferrari because we think it is a car that has proven its performance and reliability at Le Mans.

“We have never worked with Ferrari, but we’ve talked to the technical guys who say it’s good to handle. We tried to find a way which is makeable for us [and not] unnecessarily difficult.”

Walkenhorst is planning to tackle Le Mans with its full-time BMW program staff but will also introduce a couple of AF Corse technicians who are familiar with the GTE Ferrari.

“All the guys who have done Asian Le Mans with us will also do Le Mans,” said Koenigbauer.

“As we do not have experience with the car, we will need some expertise from the company we are renting it from. But we will run the car by ourselves.

“We have experience with GT3 cars, but we’ve never worked with a GTE car or a Ferrari, so it’s important to get some knowledge there, otherwise it would be very difficult, and chances of major problems would be high.

“In the background, it was very important to find someone who we trust and can help put the package together. We, as Walkenhorst, will run the full team and have one or two guys for support from the partner team.”

Walkenhorst is facing a tight schedule in the build-up to Le Mans, which slots in among its BMW programs in Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS, the Nürburgring and ADAC GT4 Germany.

The team’s other racing commitments mean that it will be difficult to run the Ferrari before the Le Mans test day, although Koenigbauer is hopeful that some preliminary work can be done.

“At the moment, it’s quite tough to find any time,” he said.

“Currently, it is not planned [to go testing]. But we still hope to find a solution to at least do something with the car before [Le Mans]. So far, nothing confirmed.

“It is a really busy season this year, but everyone is just so motivated to do Le Mans. It’s incredible. We are so proud that we can participate.

“I won’t say it’s once in a lifetime: the aim is that we do it more often. But you never know how everything will develop with the GT3 cars. We are very happy and fortunate to do it this year.”

Two New Drivers Expected for Le Mans

Walkenhorst has not yet announced its Le Mans driver lineup, but Koenigbauer confirmed that Chandler Hull will be the only member of the Asian LMS title-winning trio to return.

Hull won the championship alongside Thomas Merrill and Nicky Catsburg. Merrill contested Asian LMS as a Bronze-rated driver, however he is now ranked Silver like Hull, and GTE-Am lineups must contain one Bronze plus a Silver or another Bronze.

Catsburg, meanwhile, will drive for Corvette Racing at Le Mans as part of a full-season WEC program.

Koenigbauer indicated that Walkenhorst’s lineup is close to being finalized.

“We have a Bronze driver already, but the full lineup is still in progress and I hope to have it together soon,” he said.