Le Mans
The 4 Hours of Zhuhai, first round of the 2017/2018 Asian Le Mans Series season, will take place this weekend October 27-29 in China at the Zhuhai International Circuit. Sixteen teams, both prototypes and GTs, will take the start at the race on Sunday at 1:00 p.m. local time (5:00 a.m. in the U.K.).
Created in 2013 following licensing agreements with a company based in Asia, the Asian le Mans Series was taken over by the Automobile Club de l’Ouest in 2015. This series is a major component of the ACO's strategy and Endurance racing network. It represents the extension on the Asian continent of the values of Le Mans type Endurance races: the length of the races, mixing prototype and GT fields as well as amateur and professional drivers.
The 2017/2018 Asian Le Mans Series season is comprised of four rounds:
For this first round of the season, 16 teams will take the start, with six cars in the LMP2 class, five in LMP3, four in GT and one in GT Cup. The teams will represent nine different countries: China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Philippines, Portugal, New Zealand, Slovakia, Switzerland and Taiwan. The drivers hail from 19 various countries. Note the presence in force of the Chinese on their home turf with 11 drivers entered.
In LMP2, the class winners at this year's 24 Hours of Le Mans - Jackie Chan DC Racing, partnered with Jota for the Asian Le Mans Series - will be present with two cars. Unlike at Le Mans, Thomas Laurent (set to take the wheel of the Toyota TS050 for the Rookie Tests at Bahrain in November) will not join Ho-Pin Tung, instead Stephane Richelmi and Harisson Newey. Ho-Pin Tung will compete along with David Cheng and James Winslow.
A dominating force in sprint series this year, WIN Motorsport is entered in the LMP3 class for the Asian Le Mans Series season and is hoping to climb the ACO Endurance ladder to participate in next year's 24 Hours of Le Mans. But the competition will be considerable with the return in the class of Jackie Chan DC Racing/Jota and the KCMG team.
In GT, FIST-Team AAI is stacking the deck by entering two of the four cars in the class.
Lastly, after having won the GT Cup class in the Asian Le Mans Sprint Cup in 2017, Team NZ is the only team in the class and is looking to repeat the win in the main series.