Sao Paulo Thursday Notebook

Photo: Andrea Lorenzina/DPPI

***Four weeks after the 24 Hours of Le Mans, FIA World Endurance Championship teams and drivers trekked across to the other side of the world for the fourth round of the season at Interlagos. It is the final event before the series’ summer break and the first of the campaign to be held outside Europe following the postponement of the planned Qatar opener.

***However, three drivers have not made that trip to South America with Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA opting to field a two-driver lineup in Brazil without Louis Deletraz. Instead, Deletraz, who was the third driver in the No. 12 Cadillac V-Series.R at Le Mans, is representing the team and manufacturer at this weekend’s Goodwood Festival of Speed, taking one of the team’s Hypercar class entries up the hill. Fellow GM factory driver Ricky Taylor held the honor of doing so last year but is on IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship duty at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in a LMP2 car.

***This weekend marks the second and final overlap with the WeatherTech Championship, although it’s significantly less impactful due to CTMP not featuring the GTP class.

***The only two teams affected are Heart of Racing Team and TF Sport, with Kobe Pauwels again filling in for Eduardo Barrichello in the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo and Nico Varrone in for Nicky Catsburg in the LMGT3 class-leading No. 33 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R.

***While Barrichello, who is leading the IMSA GTD points standings, is missing his home race, father, and ex-Formula 1 star Rubens, is here this weekend supporting Dudu’s team, Heart of Racing.

***Pauwels described it as a “privilege” to be called up for a second time in place of Barrichello, especially when there were so many strong FIA Silver-graded drivers for the team to choose from. Neither Pauwels nor his co-drivers Jonny Adam and Gray Newell have previously raced at Interlagos so he’s grateful for Barrichello’s local knowledge.

***Pauwels, who was particularly surprised during the track walk by the extent of the elevation change at the first corner, told Sportscar365: “Dudu did a great job here last year but luckily he’s still on the team side so we’re sending quite a few messages by WhatsApp because he obviously knows this track blind. He gave me some tips and tricks, which hopefully will be enough to beat all of our rivals this weekend.”

***Speaking of date clashes, the recently-revealed 2026-27 FIA Formula E world championship calendar features two events that coincide with the 2027 WEC schedule. The all-electric series’ visit to Monaco on May 15-16 overlaps with the 6 Hours of Spa, while its Shanghai fixture on July 10-11 falls on the same weekend as the 6 Hours of Sao Paulo.

***However, Sportscar365 understands that a change of date for the Monaco E-Prix could be on the cards to alleviate the clash with Spa, which is the more problematic of the two as it falls before the 24 Hours of Le Mans, when WEC teams are more likely to have contract priority. At least five current WEC Hypercar drivers are likely to be impacted by the clashes.

***Sebastien Buemi, who drives for Toyota in the WEC and Envision Racing in Formula E, described the potential change as
“good news” when asked about it by Sportscar365, but stopped short of saying it would allow him to continue with a double program. “Nothing is done yet, so we still have to wait,” he said. “Whether it’s enough, I don’t know.”

***Genesis Magma Racing has opted to continue using the orange and red Magma livery that it introduced at Le Mans for this weekend in Brazil. The team said the decision followed the “resoundingly positive reaction” to the color scheme that replaced the largely gray and black designs it previously ran.

***As was the case at Imola and Spa, the only other six-hour races so far this season, Hypercar teams will be limited to a total of 30 Michelin tires (34 if the car makes it into Hyperpole) across the weekend, split up between three sets in Free Practice and qualifying and 4.5 in the race. The new-for-2026 Michelin Pilot Sport Endurance line of Medium and Hard compounds will be in action this weekend.

***Michelin Endurance program manager Pierre Alves said: “Last year, we learned a great deal thanks to the newly resurfaced track. We analyzed every stint, every pressure and temperature evolution, as well as the performance of the various strategies adopted by the teams. Several manufacturers demonstrated that it was possible to complete double stints consistently, and in some cases even to replace only the right-side tires during pit stops. This clearly illustrates both the consistency of our tires and their ability to maintain a high level of performance over extended runs.”

***Goodyear is back to using its Medium compound tire in LMGT3 this year after giving the Hard tire its global debut at this event in 2025. The tire was also used for the Lone Star Le Mans at Circuit of The Americas, season-ending 8 Hours of Bahrain, as well as this year’s European Le Mans Series season-opener at Barcelona but has since been dropped from Goodyear’s lineup.

***Goodyear Endurance program manager Stephen Bickley said: “We have a very good understanding of the Goodyear Racing Eagle Medium at Interlagos. We raced on this tire at Interlagos two years ago and it performed consistently across varying track temperatures and mixed weather conditions. This is the right compound for us to bring this weekend.”

***LMGT3 teams will have an increased allocation of four sets of tires to be used for free practice sessions and six sets between qualifying and the race, plus an additional set for cars that make it into Hyperpole.

***Both of the WRT LMGT3 crews tested at Interlagos in late May, and are understood to have been the only, if not the very few to have done so. Darren Leung and Augusto Farfus actually took part in an Endurance Brasil race in one of Leung’s Paradine Competition BMW M4 GT3 EVOs, which was freighted over. Teammates Anthony McIntosh, Parker Thompson and Dan Harper were also present for the test, utilizing a locally owned chassis.

***McIntosh, Thompson and Harper had laid out plans at the start of the year to test at every WEC circuit on this season’s calendar, and are understood to have already turned laps at Circuit of The Americas in McIntosh’s U.S.-based BMW chassis.

***Harper is looking to “bounce back” this weekend after some tough races followed the crew winning the Imola season opener. However, he does not believe Interlagos will play to the BMW’s strengths with it being quite high on tire degradation.

***When asked about the biggest challenge of his debut WEC season, Harper told Sportscar365: “As the tires get older, we start losing performance compared to a lot of other manufacturers. The BMW is notoriously quite hard on its tires, because of the high centre of gravity, we roll more than a lot of cars and this tire maybe cannot hold that as well as others. It’s something we have to deal with and every weekend we’re trying to improve and learn.”

***After a special Brazilian-themed livery was revealed as the latest design among McIntosh’s continued rotation of color schemes, both LMGT3 BMWs will in fact adopt the livery. A similar design will be on the No. 32 machine as well in deference to the Interlagos contest being Augusto Farfus’ home race.

***The WRT BMWs are also running special stickers in memory of Marc VDS team principal Marc van der Straten, who passed away last weekend. His squad achieved plenty of sports car success when fielding BMW Z4 GT3s, including winning the 2015 CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa.

***Friday’s track action is set to feature a pair of 90-minute Free Practice sessions, with the first of these due to get under way at 11 a.m. local time (10 a.m. EST).

John Dagys, Stephen Lickorish & Jamie Klein contributed to this report

Source: Sports Car 365