Monday, May 10, 2021

Taking A Breather’ from Indy 500 Mania

After all, Ain’t Thar some ‘lil Road Race that comes first?

 

So several weeks ago now, I read the Racer.com article about Bloody ‘Ol Jense’, aka 2009 Formula 1 World Champion Jenson Button wishing to return to Circuit de la Sarthe as a Werks’ Driver in 2023,. As this is when Scuderia Ferrari returns to Sports Car Prototype racing as part of the (LMH) Le Mans Hypercars brigade, joining the likes of Toyota, Glickenhaus and Peugeot.

 

Button also mentioned how he’d like to do a bit ‘O racing Stateside, since that’s where he now reside with his lovely wife Brittny Ward, January 2015 Playboy Playmate in Los Angeles.

 

This made me immediately speculate that it would be great if Button joined either the likes of Porsche or Audi in IMSA’s Weathertech SportsCar championship. Or perhaps Acura, since Jense’ once had strong ties to Honda.

 

As I did previously predict here upon No Fenders that Penske and Porsche would reunite for 2023, which has now been confirmed with Penske running a Multi-car Werks’ effort here and abroad…

 

And it would be a great boost for IMSA to have Button as one of the many Factory drivers piloting the brand new shiny Le Mans Daytona Hypercars (LMDH) in 2023, which would check all of Button’s boxes, since the LMDH prototypes are specifically designed to be eligible to compete at the 24 Heurs du Mans for outright victory. Whilst Button could also take part in other signature Sports Car races  like the Rolex 24 and 12 Hours of Sebring to name a few.

 

And while we All Groaned over how Horrible IndyCar’s Offseason was, the premiere FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) finally held Thar 2021 Season Opener at Ye “Mighty Spa,” nee Spa Francorchamps circuit on May 1st, only 168 Gory Days since it last raced at the Bahrain International Circuit on November 14, 2020. Which by my highly polished math skills is just one week shy of Indy Cars latest elongated Offseason, Groan!

 

Unfortunately Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus elected to forego the WEC Season Opener at Spa, giving us just three Top-flight LMH Chassis competing in Belgium, i.e.; Toyota’s two GR010 Hybrid’s and Alpine’s lone “Grandfathered” Rebellion R13 LMP1 car rebranded as the alpine A480. Giving us an auspicious start to the Dawning of the FIA and ACO’s Le Mans Hypercar (LMH) era. With No word on whether or not Glickenhaus will make their series Debut at Portimao on June 13th or not?