Limited to the IMSA GTP category for 2023, BMW’s LMDh program could be expanded in the future. The Endurance World Championship (WEC) is now a topic for 2024, as Mike Krack explains. Due to his move to the Aston Martin Formula 1 team, he himself will only see it from the outside.
Krack told Motorsport.com Global that a factory program in WEC 2024 is “one of our options”. This is a turnaround, because up to now the WEC has not even appeared in any BMW communiques. Of course, the greatest interest is in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
While the development in Italy is progressing in cooperation with Dallara, BMW already has to think about the future of the program: “We will go through our strategy in the coming months. What are the next steps and what will happen after 2023?” Of course, this is now happening under the leadership of Krack’s successor, Andreas Roos.
Krack confirms that discussions are ongoing with the WEC organizer ACO: “When you look at a Le Mans program you have to talk to the ACO and commit yourself for a certain period of time. All the elements have to be right for that. What does it mean Going for the Le Mans win? So far there hasn’t been a final decision.”
Ideal scenario: customer vehicles in both series
A works commitment with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing in the IMSA Sportscar Championship 2023 is secured. There are various options for the time after that. BMW has now decided on one thing: the option of using customer vehicles, which was still carefully communicated in 2021, is now a dream scenario.
“Ideally, we would have one customer in IMSA and one in WEC. With the LMDh philosophy, it would be wrong to only join as a works team. Of course, you need interested parties and you have to come to an agreement. We would be happy if we could do it that way .”
A BMW spokeswoman told Motorsport-Total.com that there are currently no concrete discussions with customers about this scenario. There would also be a question mark over the factory commitment, because Krack said in June 2021 that BMW did not want to drive against its own customers.
The compact schedule with the vehicle has so far been adhered to. the rollout is scheduled for July 2022. “Despite all the delivery difficulties at the moment, I’m very happy that we’ve been able to stick to the schedule so far,” says Krack. Meanwhile, he has not revealed anything about the engine.