Jean-Marc Finot, the French producer’s motorsport boss, informed Autosport at Spa that “my feeling is that we’re being handled unfairly”.
He didn’t point out the BoP, as a result of it’s expressly forbidden for producers, groups and drivers to speak about it within the sequence sporting laws.
However the interference from his feedback needs to be that Peugeot believes its up to date 9X8 2024 Le Mans Hypercar ought to have obtained a efficiency break for its second WEC look at Spa final weekend.
“We’ve spent one yr attempting to enhance the automobile and we don’t see the impact on the race observe or in our outcomes,” continued Finot.
“That may be very obscure and may be very dangerous for group morale.”
The brand new model of the 9X8 wasn’t aggressive on its debut at Imola in April and obtained no assist from the BoP forward of Saturday’s Spa 6 Hours.
The automobile was given a 4kg weight enhance and a 2kW (2.5bhp) energy lower forward of spherical three of the WEC in Belgium.
That was in accordance with a realignment in the BoP for the Circuit de Spa-Franchorchamps that resulted in solely minor adjustments for all of the automobiles within the Hypercar class bar the Ferrari 499P LMH, which was pegged again after Imola with a 12kg enhance in minimal weight and an influence discount of 4kW (5bhp).
#93 Peugeot Totalenergies Peugeot 9X8: Mikkel Jensen, Nico Muller
Picture by: Marco Losi / KAPPAEMEDIA
However the Car Membership de l’Ouest, which co-organises the WEC with the FIA, re-iterated a key element of the new BoP methodology introduced for 2024 in response to Finot’s feedback.
“The method of the BoP lays down a window, and if a automobile is overperforming we’ll gradual them down rapidly,” defined membership president Pierre Fillon.
“But when a automobile is underperforming we’ll react rather more slowly – that is to keep away from sandbagging.”
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Peugeot Sport technical director Olivier Jansonnie described the exhibiting at Spa as disappointing regardless of the perfect of the 2 9X8s ending within the factors in tenth place.
“We’re fairly upset by the efficiency of the automobile right here,” he stated after the race.
“We knew from the beginning, from Free Follow 1, that it might be fairly troublesome right here to be trustworthy, however we have been hoping to be a bit nearer than what we confirmed in the present day.”
Jansonnie identified that at Spa the 9X8 was fast within the quick first and final sectors, which precisely replicate sections of the Circuit de la Sarthe at Le Mans.
“We hope that we will present higher tempo on the Le Mans 24 Hours,” he continued.
“It’s fairly completely different by way of structure”.
#93 Peugeot Totalenergies Peugeot 9X8 of Paul Di Resta, Mikkel Jensen, Jean-Eric Vergne
Picture by: Alexander Trienitz
Finot refused to make any predictions for Le Mans subsequent month whereas once more steering away from point out of the BoP.
“There’s something that I can not communicate of that will likely be completely different for Le Mans, so I can not make any forecast,” he stated.
Final yr the unique model of the 9X8 posted certainly one of its greatest performances at Le Mans, main the race on 4 events between the early night and shortly earlier than the midway mark because the #93 entry shared Loic Duval, Nico Muller and Gustavo Menezes constantly ran within the prime three.
The revised model of the Peugeot has deserted the equally-sized entrance and rear tyres in favour of the narrower fronts and wider rears run by the remainder of the Hypercar area.
The rearward shift in weight distribution that has accompanied the brand new tyre dimensions has resulted in an overhaul of the aerodynamic idea and the addition of a traditional rear wing.