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Photo: Florent Gooden/DPPI Mike Conway appears increasingly likely to leave Toyota Racing at the end of the current FIA World Endurance Championship season, in a move that would put an end to a relationship with the marque that stretches back more than a decade. Conway has been a full-time member of the Toyota WEC stable since the 2015 season, having made his first outings for the Cologne-based organization in 2014. In that time, he has been part of the 2019/20 and 2021 title-winning crews, winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the latter year with Kamui Kobayashi and Jose Maria Lopez. However, Conway has for some time been regarded as the most likely member of the current Toyota roster to depart in the event that it elects to make a change for the 2027 season amid a driver market that has swung into action earlier than normal. The 42-year-old has been linked with a move away from Toyota, with Ford and McLaren believed to be among his potential destinations. Asked what his future c...

Photo: Julian Delfosse/DPPI Peugeot development driver Doriane Pin has set her sights on an eventual FIA World Endurance Championship Hypercar seat with the French manufacturer after making her full-time return to endurance racing this year. The 22-year-old French driver was unveiled as a member of the Peugeot roster at the end of March  and is combining her new role with a full season in the European Le Mans Series in the LMP2 Pro-Am class with the Duqueine squad. Pin previously contested a full season of the WEC in 2023 with Preme in LMP2 before switching her main focus to single-seaters for the last two years in the Formula Regional European Championship and the all-female F1 Academy series. But now she says her hope is to remain at Peugeot in the coming years and prove that she deserves a chance of a race seat with the Satory manufacturer. “I have been in the sim, developing the car, and I was at Spa with the full team to see them get their first pole position after five...

Photo: Florent Gooden/DPPI Eric Powell says making his 24 Hours of Le Mans debut is something he’s “worked for my whole life” as the 40-year-old Florida native hopes to proudly fly the American flag in one of two Ford Mustang GT3 EVOs on the LMGT3 grid. Powell, who received the call-up to join Proton Competition’s reshuffled full season FIA World Endurance Championship lineup this year, has been quickly coming to grips with racing on the global stage for the first time, after only previously competed in North America until this year. The 2021 TC America powered by Skip Barber Racing School TCA champion, who has also spent time in Pirelli GT4 America and IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, stepped up to GT World Challenge America powered by AWS last year in Dollahite Racing’s Mustang GT3, which led to an end-of-year tryout in Proton’s Mustang at the WEC rookie test in Bahrain. Powell, a former stunt driver at Walt Disney World, was then confirmed for a...

Source: Sports Car 365

Photo: Charly López/DPPI ***Heart of Racing Team’s Aston Martin Valkyrie led the way in Sunday’s Le Mans test day , thanks to a 3:26.293 lap time by Tom Gamble in the No. 007 entry, marking the first time the LMH-based prototype has topped a session at Circuit de la Sarthe. ***Gamble described the difference between how the Valkyrie felt on Sunday compared to its Le Mans debut last year as “night and day” noting the car’s systems and the overall balance of the car had both improved. ***However, Gamble downplayed the significance of topping the timesheets. “You don’t know what other people are doing,” he said. “We’re doing our thing. It’s a nice confidence boost, but it’s meaningless really – like qualifying on pole for this race, it’s nice, but the main thing is to be at the sharp end come Sunday afternoon. We’ll see, but it’s a nice morale boost for the team.” ***The No. 8 Toyota TR010 Hybrid rebounded from an accident in the first s...

Photo: Andrea Lorenzina/DPPI Aston Martin and The Heart of Racing Team topped the official test day ahead of next week’s 24 Hours of Le Mans as Tom Gamble set the fastest time of both the afternoon session and the day overall at the wheel of the No. 007 Valkyrie. Gamble posted his best effort of 3:26.293 with a little under two hours left on the clock in the three-hour session, going over half a second clear of the field in the process. The British driver’s time would remain unbeaten thereafter, although Brendon Hartley managed to cut that margin down to just 0.108 seconds with around 15 minutes remaining in the repaired No. 8 Toyota TR010 Hybrid. Following the incident in the morning session involving Hartley’s co-driver Ryo Hirakawa and the Algarve Pro Racing LMP2 car of Jake Hughes, Toyota was able to repair the No. 8 car during the lunch break and was ready for the start of the afternoon session. Third-fastest was the best of the Cadillac V-Series.Rs, the No....

Photo: Geoff Miller/IMSA Oscar Tunjo and Westin Workman completed weekend sweeps in the pair of IMSA VP Racing SportsCar Challenge races at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. At least for Tunjo, it was a different experience compared to his flag-to-flag win from pole on Saturday. Due to the wet weather conditions for qualifying on Saturday morning, the LMP3 grid was set by the fastest lap times in Saturday’s Race 1 on a damp-but-drying track. Although Tunjo had solid pace in the No. 1 Gebhardt Motorsport Duqueine D09 Toyota, his best race lap was only fifth fastest in Race 1 which left him out of position for Sunday’s second 45-minute race of the weekend. Tunjo gained a spot before the race even started as one car in front of him failed to present to the false grid in time. After the green flag, he leapt to third into Turn 4 on Lap 2, got to second by Lap 3 and then chased down polesitter Gian Buffomante in his No. 30 Toney Driver Development Ligier JS P325 Toyota. Buffomante led th...