It has become clear that the WEC is interested in expanding its American presence after potential races in Canada and Mexico have been discussed. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is the latest circuit to have confirmed that they are interested in hosting a WEC round in 2016.
With the famous IndyCar circuit set to hold the 100th Indy 500 in 2016, the venue is also interested in expanding to sportscars in 2016. In an interview with Racer.com, the Brickyard’s president Doug Boles said “We’d love to have sports cars back at the Speedway”. He went on to say “We haven’t focused completely on what it would be; we’d welcome the WEC or IMSA, or both, and we’d definitely want to do it in 2016, if we can make it happen, because we’re celebrating the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500 and with so much history and innovation surrounding the track, high-tech sports cars would fit perfectly into everything we’re working towards a little over a year from now.”
With the hint towards being interested in IMSA as well, it maybe be the case that a potential WEC event at Indianapolis would take a similar format to that of the current ‘Lone Star Le Mans” event held at the Circuit of the Americas. Boles also confirmed that in the event of all the plans coming off, the races would take place on the resurfaced, reconfigured road course. It may also be the case that the race is slightly longer than the usual WEC length. The race winning time of the first Indianapolis 500, back in 1911, was completed in 6 hours and 42 minutes.
A race at Indianapolis would be close to home for several teams including Chip Ganassi Racing, the team expected to run Fords GTE project, the new Nissan LMP1 programme and Corvette Racing’s IMSA and 24 Hours of Le Mans team. Several other teams including BMW Team RLL and Wayne Taylor Racing have expressed an interested in racing at Le Mans and may also be tempted to enter a WEC race at Indianapolis.
Source – Racer
Photo Credit – WEC-Magazin (Walter Schruff)