Corvette Racing at 24 Hours of Le Mans
Corvette Racing has contested the 24 Hours of Le Mans 22 times since making its debut at the French endurance classic in 2000. This year’s running, though, might be the biggest yet.
📷 © Luc Warnotte at Portimao 2023. Victory for Corvette C8.R.
Ben Keating, Nicky Catsburg and Nico Varrone will pilot the mid-engine Corvette in its final appearance at Le Mans as next year will see the debut of GT3 cars at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, including the Corvette Z06 GT3.R. But first things first – sending the C8.R out at Le Mans with a victory and getting closer to the FIA World Endurance Championship’s GTE Am title.
The Keating/Catsburg/Varrone trio won the first two WEC races of the season at the Sebring 1,000 Miles and Six Hours of Portimão and followed with a runner-up finish at the Spa Six Hours to take the championship lead. Le Mans is critical, though, as it is a double-points race and will go a long way toward determining this year’s title-winners.
📷 © Luc Warnotte at Spa-Francorchamps 2023. Corvette C8.R ended second.
Keating won last year at Le Mans in GTE Am and finished second in 2021. Catsburg will race at Le Mans for the fifth time and third year in a row for Corvette Racing, having finished second in GTE Pro in 2021. Meanwhile, Varrone made his Le Mans debut a year ago but already has a 24-hour victory under his belt this year, having won the Rolex 24 in the LMP3 class.
📷 © Luc Warnotte at Spa-Francorchamps 2023. Corvette C8.R
Corvette Racing is an eight-time winner at Le Mans with three different generations of America’s sports car. A first 24 Hours of Le Mans win for the C8.R – which won the Rolex 24 in 2021 – would be appropriate on a number of levels. One is that it would come during the Centenary running of Le Mans, which celebrates its 100th year at this event.
Secondly, a victory would cast a larger spotlight on GM’s involvement in this year’s race – one Corvette, three Cadillac V-Series.R entries in Hypercar and the Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 that will run under the Garage 56 banner this year.
NICKY CATSBURG, NO. 33 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “I want to win this race extremely bad! I feel in a way that I’ve been so lucky already this season winning some cool races and cool events. But I cannot deny that I really think we have a shot this year at Le Mans. That’s not always the case. I believe that we have an awesome team with all the experience there. We have awesome drivers. We have a cool car. I don’t see why we shouldn’t be fighting for the win. I’m already nervous and I already feel like, ‘Come on… let’s not make mistakes. Let’s bring it home.’ But it’s never easy. It’s still a mechanical sport. We saw what happened with the 64 car last year. You never know and you never know until the last five minutes of the race. It’ll be super cool and I cannot wait.”
(GTE Am vs. GTE Pro at Le Mans): “There isn’t much difference. We are still going to end up driving against pros. The only thing that might happen is that I might be in the car and there might be a Bronze driver in the other car, and you would for sure fight them differently than you would another pro. But most of the same time, we’ll out the same time with the other pros. Like we’ve seen this year, it’s a tough battle. You have many good drivers on the grid and many drivers that used to be in the Pro class before, so I don’t feel the approach is so different.”
📷 © Corvette Racing
BEN KEATING, NO. 33 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “Clearly we have a good team of drivers and a great team of engineers and pit crew at Corvette Racing. We have all the pieces of the puzzle to do well at Le Mans. I still think it’s anybody’s best guess as to who will do well. There are 62 cars on track and everyone wants to do the best they can. Twenty-four hours is a long time to expect every other driver to keep their head about them and make a good decision. Someone can make a mistake and take you out, not of your own doing. It happens often. But Le Mans is a double-points race for the championship. I don’t want to say it’s completely over, but if we were to win then I don’t know if anyone can catch us. It would be just a total dream to win Le Mans.”
(Race outlook): “Everyone wants to win Le Mans, and no one is really going to show what they have until the race starts. Then the gloves come off. Who knows what’s going to happen. That’s something you can’t control. All we can control is doing our jobs to the best of our abilities. We will deal with whatever comes up. I’ve often said that it’s really special to win a World Endurance Championship race as an American driver racing an American car, racing something I sell and racing for an American team. It’s hard to imagine what that would be like at Le Mans and the 100th Le Mans. That would be on a totally different level.”
📷 © Corvette Racing
NICO VARRONE, NO. 33 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “Le Mans is the race that everyone wants to win. It’s our race of the year. The GTE Am championship is important, but this is the biggest race for us. Le Mans is something else. This year, we’ve done very well so far and have a great start. We have two wins, another podium and lead the championship. We’ve been doing great things together as a team. The goal is to do the same as we have been doing in the first three races – how we work, how we manage situations… the same we did at Sebring, Portimão and Spa. That is my mentality going into Le Mans.”
(Learning with Corvette Racing): “One of the biggest things I’ve learned is on pit stops and how to be precise with where I stop. I’m learning to see how important it is for a pit stop to be on you marks. Corvette Racing takes it so seriously and that’s why they are so quick on their stops. We work on how to get in the box, how the procedure works and how important it is for the car to be right on the point. It’s much easier for the mechanics to do the tire changes and fuel the car. I’m also really lucky to have Nicky as a teammate. He’s one of the best drivers in the world, and he’s helping me a lot. I can see what he’s doing not only in the car but outside the car as well, how he manages situations and deals with things. He’s such a nice guy that he has no secrets with me. He shares all his experiences and all his knowledge with me just for me to get better and improve as a driver and a person. That’s something I really appreciate.”
📷 © Corvette Racing
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📷 © Luc Warnotte at Spa-Francorchamps 2023. 6 hours of Spa-Francorchamps LMGTE race
📷 © Luc Warnotte at Sebring 2023. Ben Keating among the fastest LMGTE AM drivers.
