Tuesday 5th January 2016

Ford GT WEC drivers announced

Four drivers including two Brits are confirmed for the GT programme

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The return of Ford to Le Mans this year has been the talk of sportscar racing for a while now. But before then the car will compete in both the FIA World Endurance Championship and the IMSA WeatherTech series over in the States. Today the driver line up for the WEC has been announced, pleasingly with two Brits included.

Ford's plan is for the two cars from the WEC to race with the pair competing in America to create a four-car return to Le Mans in June. The IMSA drivers are Richard Westbrook, Dirk Muller, Joey Hand and Ryan Briscoe, while driving in the WEC will be Marino Franchitti, Andy Priaulx, Olivier Pla and Stefan Mucke. They will race in the LM GTE class of the World Endurance Championship against 911s, Astons and the new Ferrari 488 GTE amongst others.

Priaulx will be a name familiar to many motorsport fans over here after his time in British Touring Cars. He followed that with three World Touring Car titles and a win at the Nurburgring 24 Hours. His most recent sportscar racing experience was with BMW over in America with a Z4.

Marino Franchitti is of course sibling of Dario Franchitti, the pair established as very competitive drivers in sportscars and single seaters on both sides of the Atlantic. Marino's most recent success was a class win at the Nurburgring 24 Hours with Glickenhaus. He's won Petit Le Mans, the Sebring 12 Hours and took the overall American Le Mans Series Championship in 2010. It's Marino's first time in the WEC but it will be his sixth race at Le Mans; interestingly one of those was in a Panoz Esperante.

Olivier Pla is described in Ford's release as 'the quiet Frenchman'; his notable successes include second place in the LMP2 class of the 2014 WEC plus second in LMP2 at Le Mans in 2013.

Stefan Mucke is the most experienced WEC driver in the line up, having competed in it since 2012. He has also raced for Mercedes in DTM and German Formula 3 also. Mucke joins Ford after eight years with Aston.

So it appears a pretty formidable driver line up and the car, while these things are all subjective, looks the absolute business as well. Low and wide and with a diffuser of destruction (not the official name), it's everything you would hope from a motorsport Ford GT.

The 2016 World Endurance Championship begins at Silverstone on April 17, but the GT's first competitive outing will be at Daytona later this month. Le Mans in 18-19 June this year, where PH will definitely be - hopefully with plenty of PHers - to see the GT return to the hallowed circuit.

[zebedee]

excellent line up. Shame about Bourdais in the US, will never forgive him for what he did to Rollcentre at Le Mans and he actively stops me supporting a team he is part of! Particularly please for Marino.

[thegreenhell]

Richard Westbrook in the IMSA and Le Mans team is also British.