The 2017 ELMS Season is Go at Monza

The 2-day test, which begins on Tuesday 28 March, will give the teams and drivers 14 hours of track time over five sessions, including a 2-hour night session, on the fast 5.8km Monza Grand Prix circuit. The Official Test also provides the opportunity for the teams to put some drivers through their paces before announcing their full driver line ups for the first race at Silverstone on Saturday 15 April.

All of the three 2016 championship winning teams will be present, with G-Drive Racing in LMP2, United Autosports in LMP3 and Beechdean AMR in LMGTE.

Thirteen LMP2 cars will thunder around the Monza track and this will be the first opportunity for the fans to see the largest gathering of the new generation of LMP2 cars in Europe. 

The G-Drive Racing Oreca07, which this year will wear the no22, will be driven by Memo Rojas, Ryo Hirakawa and Leo Roussel and run by the Dragonspeed team.  The American team will field the same trio of drivers as last year – Nico Lapierre, Henrik Hedman and Ben Hanley.

Fabien Barthez returns to the ELMS for another season of LMP2, the French soccer legend being joined by TimotheBuret and Nathanael Berthon to complete an all French lineup.

Last year’s LMP3 front runners United Autosports, Graff, CetilarVillorba Corseand Tockwith Motorsports have all moved up to LMP2 in 2017.  LMP3 champions United Autosports are running the LMP2 Ligier JSP217 alongside their pair of Ligier JS P3s in preparations for their debut in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Racing Team Nederland return to the ELMS with Jan Lammers and Frits Van Eerd completing a full Dutch team.

All Danish team High Class Racing will join the ELMS grid this year running a Dallara-Gibson while IDEC Sport Racing and Algarve Pro Racing will be running the Ligier chassis this season and complete the 13 full season ELMS entries.

A mammoth entry of 21 LMP3 cars for the ELMS Official Test will see all sixteen full season entries being joined by five addition cars.

Reigning champions United Autosports will be fielding their two full season cars and will bring a further two Ligier Nissans to take advantage of the opportunity to test on one of Europe’s best circuits.Duqueine Engineering will also be bring both of their Ligier-Nissans that are entered for the full season and the French team will field a third entry.

M.Racing YMR will be bringing both their cars to Monza including the brand new Norma M30.  Italian team Oregon Team have also opted to run the Norma chassis in 2017 and are due to test the car at Monza.

Father and Son duo Alexander Talkanitsa Senior and Junior will have the first opportunity to test their AT Racing LMP3 Ligier as the Belarussians move up from the LMGTE category.  2016 competitors 360 Racing, By Speed Factory, Eurointernational, RLR MSport, Inter Europol Competition, Panis Barthez Competition and Ultimate are all back to test their cars and drivers at Monza ahead of the opening race of the 2017 season at Silverstone in April.

The seven full season LMGTE entries are all due to test at Monza with 2016 champions Beechdean AMR running their Aston Martin V8 Vantage.  Andrew Howard and Darren Turner are joined by former British GT4 champion Ross Gunn.  Reigning Michelin GT3 Le Mans Cup champions TF Sport are also testing their Aston Martin V8 Vantage.

The three Ferraris will be running on home soil at Monza with a pair of AF Corse run Spirit of Race F488 GTEs being joined by 2016 LMGTE Vice Champions JMW Motorsport.  The final two cars in the Official Test line up are the pair of Porsche 911 RSRs run by Proton Competition.

The ELMS Official Test will take place on Tuesday 28 and Wednesday 29 March and is open to the public.

CLICK HERE to download the provisional entry list