The top 10 LMP drivers of 2013

A list of the top prototype drivers from around the globe is always going to be packed full of names from the World Endurance Championship, now that there is such a thing.

It is here that the manufacturers strut their stuff and they will always have the best talent on offer. So there can be no apologies for the number of Audi and Toyota drivers here.

1 Andre Lotterer
WEC runner-up

Lotterer failed to retain his Le Mans 24 Hours or World Endurance Championship crowns in 2013, but he still proved beyond any reasonable doubt that he is the best prototype driver in the world. Time and time again.

The guy is super-quick, whether that's over one lap or a stint, single, double or otherwise. He doesn't have off days and doesn't make mistakes. What more can you say?

A relentlessly fast pace as he and his team-mates fought back from a seventh-hour delay at the Le Mans 24 Hours was probably the highlight, but he could be counted on to perform every time out. Witness a string of fastest race laps, some of them achieved even when his Audi R18 didn't appear to be a match for its rivals.

2 Loic Duval
WEC champion
Le Mans 24 Hours winner

The Frenchman showed that he is the new Lotterer on his promotion to a full-season drive with Audi. Like his in-house rival for the WEC title, you knew that he was going to do the business every time he climbed aboard the car.

That shouldn't have been a surprise given his pace in the ORECA-run Peugeot in 2010-11. But perhaps the way he slotted in alongside the long-standing McNish-Kristensen partnership and reinvigorated the veteran drivers was his greatest achievement.

And that is why he is surely destined for the same kind of greatness as his team-mates of this past season.

3 Allan McNish
WEC champion
Le Mans 24 Hours winner

The Scot proved that he was back on form from the get-go in 2013. His charge to victory at the Silverstone WEC opener to beat Lotterer to the chequered flag was classic McNish.

That set the tone for a season in which he and his team-mates outperformed the drivers of the sister car in approximately half the races. That's why McNish - and Kristensen - should be considered worthy champions and why he can now hang up his helmet with such satisfaction.

A third Le Mans win and a world title provided the perfect end to an illustrious career.

4 Tom Kristensen
WEC champion
Le Mans 24 Hours winner

Kristensen, too, was a man back in his stride after the disappointment of a disjointed season in 2012. Perhaps a return to left-foot braking had something to do with it and also the arrival of Duval, but an end to the constant car - and engineer - swapping of last year was probably the most significant factor in his resurgence.

Kristensen, like McNish, now had a proper platform from which to take the fight to a trio of reigning world champions who had consistently outperformed them the previous season. And they both made the most of it.

It would probably be wrong to say that Kristensen was back to his best, but at 46 that was never likely to be the case.

5 Anthony Davidson
Third place in WEC

Davidson showed no ill-effects from his back-breaking Le Mans shunt in 2012 and shone at every race. The only exception was Austin when there were mitigating circumstances: he'd been up all night following the birth of his second child and was only given a single stint.

The Brit was probably the best Toyota driver over the full season (though not all of them had a complete season, remember). Everyone went wild about Benoit Treluyer's drive at Shanghai in the #1 Audi, but he did have an equal in China - and that man was Davidson.

6 Sebastien Buemi
Third place in WEC

Buemi came of age as a sportscar driver in 2013. Given the chance of what turned out to be a full-season drive with Toyota, he grasped it with both hands.

There was a new-found consistency in his driving, and nowhere was it more apparent than at Le Mans. He coped with everything a topsy-turvy race held in changeable conditions threw at him.

7 Alex Wurz
Fourth place in WEC

The Austrian gets the nod over co-driver Nicolas Lapierre for a greater consistency of performance. A shunt at Le Mans was a black mark against his team-mate's name, despite the mitigating circumstances of the wet conditions.

Wurz was quick over one lap and notched up more poles than any other driver (two with Lapierre and one with Kazuki Nakajima). He performed in the races, but the fact that he only missed two yet only won the non-race at Fuji means he can't be rated higher after such a successful season in 2012.

8 Mike Conway
Third place in LMP2 in WEC

Conway was the stand-out performer in LMP2 in the WEC this season. And that's no mean achievement for a sportscar rookie given the quality of driver packed into the class this year.

The Brit proved his pace and consistency at every turn (there was only one mistake in the shape of a spin in qualifying at Fuji), and also that he has the correct temperament to become a top-line driver.

There was to be no end-of-season silverware for Conway, despite victory in four of the eight races with the G-Drive/Delta-ADR team. Now that he has been picked up by Toyota as test-and-reserve driver for next year's WEC, that doesn't really matter.

9 Oliver Turvey
Third in ELMS

Turvey was always going to be quick in a prototype given his single-seater pedigree, but he proved in his debut season of sportscar racing that he has a big future ahead of him. He wasn't just fast over one lap, he was super-consistent and didn't make mistakes.

That much was apparent from the start when he handled diabolical conditions at the Silverstone European Le Mans Series opener to claim a debut victory in LMP2 with the Jota Zytek team. That he didn't win again with team-mate Simon Dolan essentially boiled down to misfortune.

But the McLaren Formula 1 development driver kept his name in the spotlight with a string of pole positions. Only once over the five ELMS races did he not plant his Zytek-Nissan on the pole.

10 Brendon Hartley
Fifth in ELMS

An impressive second season of sportscar racing from Hartley encompassed two codes: he starred on both sides of the Atlantic in the European Le Mans Series and in Grand-Am Daytona Prototypes on the way to the ultimate prize of a Porsche LMP1 seat for 2014.

Hartley starred in the wet at Silverstone for the Murphy Prototypes squad, though he ultimately missed out on a first ELMS win courtesy of his own mistake in the horrid conditions. The fact that he didn't make an error when he encountered major braking problems at the other end of the season at Paul Ricard to break his duck proved that he is cut out for sportscar racing.

As did a string of impressive performances with the Starworks team in Grand-Am that included victory at Road America.