Le Mans 24 Hours, 2017

Le Mans demands respect – Alonso

World Endurance Championship

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Fernando Alonso says he will approach his first Le Mans 24 Hours with “respect” as he prepares to compete in the 2018 and 2019 races for Toyota.

“Le Mans is one of the those races in motorsport that everyone knows from a very young age,” said Alonso. ” We are kids, we are always hearing about Le Mans and all the legends that raced there and all the teams that won there. We see road cars when we are kids that won at Le Mans. We see a lot of things related to this special event. Watching on the television is already amazing so I cannot imagine how it is driving.”

Fernando Alonso, Toyota, World Endurance Championship, Bahrain, 2017
Alonso will race for Toyota as well as McLaren this year
“I cannot wait until June but I know before that big event I need to do some tests. I need to do simulator, I need to race at Spa because you need to prepare [for] that race, you need to respect that race and I’ll try to do that.”

Alonso will race in the 2018-19 World Endurance Championship ‘super season’ which includes the next two editions of the Le Mans 24 Hours.

“The motivation behind joining this project is just how amazing are those cars,” he said, “and how amazing it will be to race in the World Endurance Championship.”

“Especially two times Le Mans: One in 2018, one in ’19. A dream come true. One of the most iconic races in motorsport calendar, with one of the best teams in the world, with one of the most sophisticated cars in the world. So I cannot wait.”

Alonso raced in the Daytona 24 Hours in January and will compete in another 26 international racing events this year since the Fuji WEC round was moved to accommodate him. “It’s going to be a very busy year for me combining Formula One and the endurance championship,” he added.

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Le Mans 24 Hours, 2017
Le Mans 24 Hours, 2017

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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11 comments on “Le Mans demands respect – Alonso”

  1. LOL.

    Respect!

  2. I want to know who was disrespecting Le Mans. Asking for a friend named Fred.

    ;-)

  3. hats off to the man if he manages to be competitive all year

    still think what WEC did is a bit farsical, but considering the decline of the LMP1, with just one proper team, they had to do something, guess it is their problem

    1. @johnmilk You clearly don’t follow the WEC. Yes, there’s only Toyota, but behind that there’s a wonderful field, no different than Mercedes leading 2014-2017.

      1. If you remove Ferrari and Red Bull that would be true.

  4. It will be disrespectful that Toyota are racing for victory this year with no real opposition.

    1. So what should they do mate, just quit??

    2. Disrespectful to who? Audi often only had token competition.

  5. It seems certain that Fernando realises he wont get a 3rd F1 title so looking elsewhere.
    You can tell he hates the fact that he will get 2, Seb 4 and unless something happens this year Lewis 5.
    He thinks he is better than both those guys (I tend to agree, Lewis a bit closer or better than he, but not in his own mind) but the guy made bad choices. He could have 4 or 5 in another world- but that is F1

    1. I would say, rather bad luck than bad choices. Afterwards it’s easy to criticise.

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