WEC Hypercar Series 2023 / 2024 FEATURETTE
Battle of the brands!
Alpine, BMW, Cadillac, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, Peugeot, Toyota, Vanwall and more: The World Endurance Championship (WEC) has become insanely competitive than in the Hypercar top class in 2024. With ten manufacturers in there, a boom was highely expected, with which the WEC and the 24 Hours of Le Mans have finally celebrated the new golden age of prototype racing. (Aston Martin has also announced its intention to compete for victories in the Hypercar class as soon as possible). The Hypercar class is so successful that the LMP2 category will have to make way for it in 2024. It will only compete at Le Mans.
MoreArt offers the matching 24h of Le Mans diorama, with Alpine in the background and artificial floodlights. MiniGT and Sparky also offer a range of exciting new models from the WEC category, even though MiniGT presents the models under the IMSA licence. For example, the Cadillac V-Series R models, the BMW M Hybrid V8 and Acura ARX-06 are all labelled as IMSA vehicles on the packaging, as the cars also compete in the USA. Incidentally, IMSA stands for the International Motor Sports Association, a US motor sport organisation.
Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-06
This 2023 model has a very special history: At the 2023 IMSA season opener, MSR had won the famous 24-hour race in the LMDh-Acura's race debut, but was subsequently convicted of competition cheating. The team was found to have manipulated the tyre pressures. Meyer Shank Racing was allowed to keep the victory - as is customary in the USA - but received a flood of penalties: loss of 200 team and driver points in the IMSA standings, loss of all team and driver points in the Michelin Endurance Cup, loss of the race prize money, a 50,000 US dollar fine, plus a temporary suspension (team owner Mike Shank) and a full suspension (team engineer Ryan McCarthy). The Daytona scandal has apparently been ‘forgotten’ in the meantime, and Meyer Shank Racing will return to IMSA in 2025 with Honda and its US subsidiary Acura.
BMW M Hybrid V8
BMW had decided to enter the WEC with its LMDh racing car in the wake of the success of the hypercar class. The M Hybrid V8 has been racing in the IMSA SportsCar Championship since 2023 and celebrated its first victory at Watkins Glen, but has yet to gain a foothold in the WEC. The MiniGT model is an absolute eye-catcher and, as usual, impresses with an extremely high level of attention to detail in every single way! Such a striking livery for sure!
Cacillac V-Series R
After a rather mixed 2023 season, which was saved by a podium finish at Le Mans, the question arose as to whether Cadillac would like to upgrade to two cars in the coming season. The Ganassi team only fielded the blue LMDh car full-time in 2023, with the yellow V-Series.R added at Spa and Le Mans. MiniGT released both IMSA versions in yellow and blue, as well as the brand-new red livery of the V-Series.R. This went to Le Mans 2023 with the number 311.
Porsche 963
Jota-Porsche made spectacular headlines. The WEC commitment will be expanded to include a second LMDh in 2024. The 963 has already won in the IMSA series at Long Beach. At Le Mans in 2023, colourful 963 Porsches competed for Penske Racing, but they did not yet have the right bite for a win. The speed of the V8 coupé with 680 hp was right, but the reliability wasn't quite there yet. But at least in terms of race decoration, the 963s were already ahead. These models of the colourful Penske 963 Porsche are also available from Sparky, but we have focussed this time on the plain Hertz Team Jota Porsche from 2023 with golden and white applications. Unfortunately, it finished the hypercar class in last place.
The other brands such as Lamborghini, Peugeot, Alpine or Toyota
With the victory at Le Mans, Ferrari has already lifted the big trophy in its first year with its LMH racing car. For the time being, the 499P continued to be run by AF Corse in the WEC. Ferrari initially ruled out customer cars due to the complexity of the hypercar, but in autumn 2023 everything suddenly happened very quickly and a third hypercar was entered privately by AF Corse in cooperation with Richard Mille. Unfortunately, we won't be seeing a suitable 1:64 scale model of the 499P any time soon, as Ferrari is by far the most difficult company to work with when it comes to licence themes. So my guess is that in the near future some Asian companies will release the model without licence rights and it will disappear as quickly as it appeared.
We will also soon see a hypercar from Lamborghini, which will be taken up by MiniGT. However, the SC63 has yet to really impress.
The Peugeot 9X8 is about to undergo a major update, in which the aerodynamic concept will be completely turned on its head. Among other things, the LMH racer will be fitted with a rear wing. Whether we will see a model of this is questionable.
But Sparky could be trusted to do it.
The newcomer Alpine has not yet released an adaptation of the A424 in 1/64th scale, but Sparky has released several F1 cars from Alpine.
So there is a good chance that we might be able to add the A424 to our collection at some point.
That leaves Toyota. They are staying in the WEC for the long term and will be chasing titles with the GR010.
Here, both Sparky and MiniGT can hope to add a really great 1:64 scale model to their collection.
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