Why Porsche’s final Le Mans driver choice is intriguing

Seasoned hands at the Le Mans 24 Hours like me are fond of a historical precedent - and so too, it seems, is Porsche.

It has decided to bring in Pascal Wehrlein from its Formula E squad for the World Endurance Championship blue riband in June and give the reigning FE title winner the chance to win the race on debut with a seat in the third factory 963 LMDh. Debutants, big names and otherwise, have done rather well for the German manufacturer over the years.

Most recently, of course, it recruited Nico Hulkenberg from Formula 1 to drive the extra factory 919 Hybrid LMP1 at Le Mans in 2015. The German, racing with Force India at the time, helped deliver Porsche its first outright win at the big race for nearly 20 years together with Nick Tandy and Earl Bamber. Hulkenberg was the star signing for the additional car, but Bamber was also making his first start at the French enduro. Often forgotten, that one: it was the Kiwi’s first year on the books of the Stuttgart marque.

Scroll back to Porsche’s previous win in 1998 with the 911 GT1-98, and it recruited Laurent Aiello to drive alongside Allan McNish and Stephane Ortelli on a reshuffle of its line-up after Yannick Dalmas broke his arm when he slipped on some water in a supermarket car park.

“A freak shopping accident” is how I cheekily described it at the time, tipping my hat to This is Spinal Tap, the comedy rock mockumentary. Aiello at the time was well on the way to becoming arguably the greatest tin-top driver of all time but remained a rank sportscar rookie.

Two years before Alex Wurz had driven the winning Porsche WSC95. He wasn’t a Porsche signing, rather Joest Racing brought him in from its Opel ITC touring squad to drive what was a works-backed car. The following year a certain Tom Kristensen made a winning Le Mans debut in the same machine, now without factory support, at a few days’ notice. 

Wehrlein will be hoping to emulate Hulkenberg in winning on his Le Mans debut with Porsche

Photo by: Andreas Beil

TK even had to leave France during the qualifying days to go and test his Formula 3000 car, so his laps before his starring performance during the race were limited. A Le Mans first-timer he might have been, but he wasn’t racing a sportscar for the first time like Wurz and Aiello: he’d already done a full season in the All-Japan GT Championship, not forgetting a one-off in a Group C Toyota in the Far East.

I’ve always believed that if you can drive, you can drive. Racing cars, with one or two notable exceptions, have four wheels that sit on the track and one more that the driver hangs onto in the cockpit. The rule in force for some years - but thankfully not now — that made participation in the pre-event Test Day mandatory seemed at odds with the story of Kristensen’s debut at a race that he went on to make his own. (These days, a platinum-rated driver is allowed to miss the test if they have a clashing race, with the suitable permission from the authorities.)

It may be that Wehrlein excels alongside Tandy and Felipe Nasr on his Le Mans debut, that he proves to be their equal, but there’s a chance he may not. Priority number one for the 963 programme this year is a 20th outright Le Mans victory for Porsche. It has made that crystal clear. The third car, it has always insisted, shouldn’t be regarded as that. Rather it wants it to be one of three, all with the same chance of victory. 

Why did Porsche pass up the opportunity to fill the vacant berth in the #4 PPM entry with one of the drivers with extensive Le Mans and sportscar experience on its roster?

Last year, Josef Newgarden played a part in Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Daytona 24 Hours victory - a bit part because he spent limited time in the car during the race. Roger Penske was pretty blunt when asked if his IndyCar megastar was a contender for Le Mans: he wasn’t running a “driving school”, he insisted.

That comment 12 months ago begs a question today: why did Porsche pass up the opportunity to fill the vacant berth in the #4 PPM entry with one of the drivers with extensive Le Mans and sportscar experience on its roster? It would be easy to suggest that it has chosen the wrong man from FE to fill the vacancy created when it slimmed down its full-time WEC roster from six to four drivers. (With two of its four IMSA pilots, Matt Campbell and Mathieu Jaminet, already slated to drive the regular WEC cars at the double-points round in France, it only had two left for the additional entry.) 

Antonio Felix da Costa is Wehrlein’s team-mate in the factory Porsche FE squad and has proven credentials at Le Mans. The Portuguese has contested the race six times and was a class winner in LMP2 with Jota back in 2022 (and finished second in ’20) and has also raced a 963 at the 24 Hours for the British team in 2023. 

Why did Porsche not sign a driver with experience of the 24-hour enduro?

Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images

Maybe to have brought in da Costa would have represented a loss of face for Porsche. It barred him from racing in the WEC, Le Mans included, last year so he could focus on his FE campaign. 

The other Porsche-contracted FE driver is Nico Muller, who has been farmed out to Andretti this season. The former Peugeot man doesn’t have da Costa’s experience at Le Mans, just the three starts, but he knows about sportscar racing. During his eight-year stint with Audi he raced its GT machinery regularly. 

That’s something Wehrlein hasn’t done with Porsche, nor for Mercedes during his years on its books. Right now he has one sportscar race under his belt, an outing at Daytona this year when he drove the JDC-Miller team’s 963. 

His debut comes at a time when Le Mans and the WEC is more competitive than ever, and also the rules concerning safety cars are more intricate than in the past. That means I can’t help wondering whether Porsche has made the wrong call on this one. 

But if Wehrlein wins with Tandy and Nasr, it will be a great story.

Doubts linger over Wehrlein's ability to win Le Mans on his debut, but if he does it'll be a great story

Photo by: Andreas Beil