In 2023, the pointy end of the FIA World Endurance Championship grid will be awfully busy. By that year, the likes of Ferrari, Porsche and Audi will have joined the fold, which should make for some incredible racing.
For the debut of the Le Mans Hypercar class in 2021, however, proceedings will be a little quieter. Alpine will be running a rebranded Rebellion R13 LMP1 machine (permitted under ‘grandfathered’ regulations), with Toyota’s sole, proper LMH challenger coming from Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus.
The American company has been remarkably open about the development of its tool for the job, the 007. Insight into the car’s creation at Podium Advanced Technologies in Italy has been extensive, with regular social media updates from Glickenhaus detailing major steps in the project leading up to early tests in Vallelunga and Monza. YouTube channel 19Bozzy92 has since released some footage of the car being put through its paces at the latter (below).
As you can hopefully hear, its 3.5-litre twin-turbo V8 sounds rather lovely being put through its paces. Unlike the similarly-sized V6 in Toyota’s GR010, the 007C’s engine won’t be supplemented by a hybrid system. The team had originally wanted to run one, before switching to a pure ICE setup to avoid additional complexity and weight.
At Monza, the 007 was driven by Pipo Derani, Romain Dumas and Ryan Briscoe. Gustavo Menezes, Olivier Pla, Richard Westbrook and Franck Mailleux complete the team of drivers that’ll be piloting the two cars fielded by Glickenhaus this year.
The squad won’t be making it to the season-opening round in Portugal next month, electing instead to focus on the 007’s test regime, which started a few weeks later than originally planned.