The Asian underdog taking on the mighty GT factories at Le Mans

Asked about his ambitions for the privateer HubAuto Racing Porsche squad that has made the brave step of taking on the GTE Pro factory teams at Le Mans this year, team principal and owner Morris Chen doesn’t mince his words.

“To be one of the greatest GT sports teams in the world,” Chen replies. “Certainly, the greatest Asian GT sports team.”

With three manufacturers – Porsche, Ferrari and Chevrolet – each fielding two cars, there will be stiff competition for a team primarily staffed by a Taiwanese, Malaysian and Australian crew that has only one previous Le Mans start, in the Am class with a Ferrari.

Headed up by Aussie team director Philip Di Fazio, who rose to prominence engineering Heikki Kovalainen and Will Power in their British Formula 3 days with Fortec, HubAuto’s greatest success to date has come in GT3 competition. In 2019, it won the California 8 Hours round of SRO’s Intercontinental GT Challenge at Laguna Seca, with Australians Nick Foster and Tim Slade joined by Ferrari factory driver Miguel Molina.

But the team has shown clear ambitions to break into ACO-governed racing, prompted by Chen in 2015 making his Le Mans debut as a driver. That year, the first time his nation had been represented at the world-famous enduro, he was one of two Taiwanese drivers on the grid, along with the unrelated Jun San Chen.

“The dream quickly became to race in my own team in my own car,” recalls Chen, “and then this year to be the first Asian and Taiwanese team to enter the GTE Pro class.” 

Team owner Chen has ambitious plans for his team

Photo by: HubAuto Racing

HubAuto earned an automatic invitation for the 24 Hours last year after winning the 2019-20 Asian Le Mans Series GT class title. Chen was joined at Le Mans by Tom Blomqvist and Marcos Gomes, the crew’s Ferrari leading GTE Am for a time before being sidelined by engine failure.

“Every event you take away lessons learnt, and we did that last year,” explains Di Fazio, who has extensive Porsche experience from his time in Carrera Cup Asia, GT Asia and the China GT series. “Every race has it’s peculiarities and these are important to experience first-hand. Even though it’s a different car for 2021, we still have critical data that we use and we learn from the entire experience.”

"They are always making things happen in a good way. In every series they go to and even when they run different cars, they have always been competitive, which shows [there is] a lot of quality behind" Maxime Martin

The squad was originally slated to compete in the Am class again this year, but made the move into the Pro ranks when, Chen says, HubAuto’s sponsors “felt we were ready to step up” and provided the support required to not rely on paying drivers.

“Our sponsors mainly were one of the key driving factors,” he adds. “They believed in us and believed in the ability of the team. We were able to get the GTE Pro entry and they were prepared to provide the financial backing for us as a result.” 

It has allowed Chen to bring together a strong driver line-up of Maxime Martin, Alvaro Parente and Dries Vanthoor, each of whom currently has or recently has had factory GT driver status. Last year’s GTE Pro Le Mans winner and WEC GT drivers’ championship runner-up Martin was left without a full-time drive when Aston Martin withdrew, leaving the Belgian with slim pickings for a chance to repeat his 2020 victory.

“I was definitely looking for a seat for Le Mans, I wanted to be back there, but I wasn’t really thinking about the GTE Pro class,” admits Martin. “If you are not with one of the manufacturers in GTE Pro, you have no real chance to be there.”

But due to what he describes as “a bit of a coincidence”, with a Super GT date clash ruling Kovalainen out of the running, Martin was given an unexpected opportunity to return alongside Parente and Vanthoor. The youngest member of the trio at 23, Audi GT3 ace Vanthoor will be eager to avenge his recent defeat in the Spa 24 Hours to Ferrari’s Alessandro Pier Guidi and continue his 100% hit rate in the WEC – he won on his only previous appearance, in the GTE Am class at Le Mans in 2017.

Vanthoor, Parente and Martin each has strong credentials, but none has Porsche GTE experience

Photo by: Marc Fleury

Like its fellow privateer Porsche entry, the Proton Competition-run WeatherTech example that has works drivers Laurens Vanthoor and Earl Bamber joining Silver-graded Cooper MacNeil, HubAuto is using the same spec of 911 RSR as the factory. Introduced for the 2019-20 WEC, it endured a difficult debut at Le Mans last year, both cars struggling for pace and finishing multiple laps down after power-steering and electrical issues.

But in the hands of the factory, it has taken pole for all three WEC races so far this year and won twice – Kevin Estre and Neel Jani followed their triumph at Spa with a hard-earned victory over Ferrari last time out at Monza – to firmly rule out any question marks over the competitiveness of the package.

HubAuto has partnered with long-time Porsche customer Project 1 to ease its turnaround from running a Mercedes at the Spa 24 Hours – where its Pro class entry finished a much-delayed 37th, hindered by damage from a left-rear puncture and various niggling issues – and get up to speed faster.

“They are always making things happen in a good way,” enthuses Martin of HubAuto. “In every series they go to and even when they run different cars, they have always been competitive, which shows [there is] a lot of quality behind.

“To go to GTE Pro is something very ambitious because you know that you will have to fight against the factories and you know how hard it can be, but it shows the mentality. If they do things, they do it to win. They are not just there to make up the numbers, that’s for sure.”

Winning is always the goal, but Martin knows the team has a huge mountain to climb, with all three drivers new to each other and the car. Vanthoor hasn’t raced a Porsche since the 2016 Dubai 24 Hours, when he made his maiden foray in GT racing after moving across from single-seaters in a 991 Cup car, while 2016 Bathurst 12 Hours winner Parente has never raced a 911, having specialised in McLaren, Bentley and Acura GT3s. Like Vanthoor, the versatile Portuguese hasn’t raced at Le Mans since 2017.

Martin has raced a 911 GT3-R this season at the Nurburgring and Spa 24 Hours, and his seat time in KCMG’s Porsche at Spa increased significantly when team-mate Laurens Vanthoor (Dries’s older brother) was knocked over by a quad bike in the paddock and forced to withdraw after driving less than four hours. But Martin points out that it’s “another experience” altogether to racing the full-fat, mid-engined GTE version.

“It’s two different cars, the engine is in a different place so it’s a completely different concept,” he says. “I’m going to start from scratch again.”

Martin, flanked by team-mates Tincknell and Lynn, claimed GTE Pro honours last year with Aston

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Practice will therefore be hugely important as the three drivers get used to the car and how each likes to drive it, before agreeing on a set-up direction that is the best compromise for the trio.

“Le Mans is very special because even though you can run a GTE on a normal track with normal downforce, when you go to Le Mans with the low downforce it’s already a different car to start with,” Martin states. “It’s going to be very hard for all three of us, but we are all professional drivers and we can definitely do a good job.

“For sure we won’t be as well-prepared as the factory drivers because that’s what they do all year long and they’ve been testing a lot in Le Mans configuration. But I think we can adapt and we will still have a good package to do something well. The team has quite some experience now also in this category, so I think it’s more about our line-up, the experience I can give to my team-mates from what I know.

"We aim to be on the lead lap and cross the finish line at the end. Having said that, anything is possible – and a podium finish is a realistic possibility" Morris Chen

“From lap one until the last lap, it’s qualifying. You have to push from the beginning to the end and if you don’t have the pace, you have no chance. I think that’s quite clear.”

Even if the GTE Pro class at Le Mans is no longer as deep as it once was – 16 of the 17 GTE Pro entries in 2019 were factory cars, including four Porsches, four Fords, plus a brace apiece of Ferraris, Corvettes, BMWs and Aston Martins – it will still be a stern test to become the first privateer since Risi Competizione in 2016 to reach the podium. For Chen, “the main aim is to finish”.

“We aim to be on the lead lap and cross the finish line at the end,” says Chen. “We certainly have strong drivers and the internal skills to do that. Having said that, anything is possible – and a podium finish is a realistic possibility.”

“If at the end of the race we’re on the podium, I think we all can be more than happy,” adds Martin.

Should it achieve that feat, then Chen’s stated aim of becoming Asia’s greatest GT team will go a long way to being realised.

A podium finish is the target for the team's debut with a Porsche

Photo by: Marc Fleury