Lamborghini open to new LMDh partners for WEC return

Lamborghini will begin on the lookout for new associate groups to proceed its LMDh undertaking past 2025 if it will probably show the competitiveness of the automotive on this yr’s IMSA SportsCar Championship.

The Italian producer has taken over the lead of the race programme for this yr with an IMSA-only assault on the 5 endurance rounds following its break up with Iron Lynx.

However it has outlined a imaginative and prescient to return in 2026 in IMSA and the World Endurance Championship with factory-supported buyer groups.

“It’s not our ambition sooner or later to be a racing workforce,” defined Lamborghini chief know-how officer Rouven Mohr.

“It’s clear that if we go to the subsequent step and enlarge the programme, it makes solely sense if the automotive is sorted and the efficiency of the automotive is on the degree of our GT3 automobiles [in terms of competitiveness] and we will put the automotive in buyer arms.

“We’ll choose the long run programmes relying on how briskly we’re progressing with the efficiency improvement.”

Mohr added that he’s “super-positive” that Lamborghini Squadra Corse, its in-house motorsport division, will have the ability to make the SC63 aggressive over the course of this yr.

However he insisted that it stays too early to decide to plans for 2026.

“One step after the opposite: first we’ve to contemplate the advance of the LMDh after which if we’re aggressive and we discover the curiosity of a workforce or groups to re-enter, let’s see,” he mentioned.

Lamborghini prompt that the WEC stays very a lot in its plans.

Firm CEO Stephan Winkelmann described the Le Mans 24 Hours, the centrepiece spherical of the WEC, as a race that “provides plenty of visibility” and that he would “like to be again as quickly as doable”.

Rohr wouldn’t go into element in regards to the break up with Iron Lynx, which is believed to not have been totally resolved.

The Italian workforce was a key associate within the SC63 undertaking and ran a full season with a single automotive within the 2024 WEC and in addition entered 4 of the 5 IMSA enduros with one entry.

“Our future pursuits had been just a little bit totally different and we determined to go our separate methods,” he mentioned.

That divergence included the choice to face down from the WEC because of the rule change demanding that producers within the Hypercar class should run two automobiles.

Iron Lynx workforce principal Andrea Piccini mentioned on the WEC finale in Bahrain final November that the workforce was “able to run two automobiles”.

Mohr defined that the transfer by Squadra Corse to take over the race programme was motivated by a need “to have full management on additional improvement of the automotive”.

“Final yr we had been seeing some potential, and we mentioned that if we’ve extra management we will higher develop the efficiency,” he defined.

Lamborghini has employed the Riley Motorsports squad to supply the spine of the workforce operating the solo SC63 entered underneath the Automobili Lamborghini Squadra Corse banner within the five-race IMSA Endurance Cup, starting with final weekend’s Daytona 24 Hours.

The deal was put collectively on the final minute following the divorce from Iron Lynx, which remained concerned up till the official IMSA check at Daytona in November.

Riley obtained the SC63 it ran at Daytona in early January and it’s understood that it’s a improvement chassis slightly than one of many automobiles that Iron Lynx fielded final yr.

New Squadra Corse boss Maurizio Leschiutta defined {that a} plan is in place to introduce no less than one evo joker over the course of the 2025 season.

He defined that improvement will deal with “automobile dynamics, suspension and aero” which he described as “the three ache factors” of the SC63 because it stands.

Lamborghini’s GTP entry pushed by Mirko Bortolotti, Romain Grosjean, Daniil Kvyat and Edoardo Mortara retired from Daytona after 58 minutes with what had been described as powertrain points associated to the cooling system.

Solely Bortolotti, who ran as excessive as eighth after beginning ninth, obtained to drive the automotive within the race.