2022 marks a new beginning for the World Endurance Championship in the sense that LMP1 will be phased out in favor of Le Mans Hypercar regulations. Peugeot is one of the automakers that accepted the challenge to design this kind of vehicle, and this is our first glimpse of the track weapon.
Peugeot had initially collaborated with Rebellion for this project, but that arrangement didn’t work out as intended. Total is the new partner for the yet-to-be-named Le Mans Hypercar, an oil company that also produces lubricants. Not a bad pairing given the comfortable financial results of Total, but Peugeot isn’t doing bad either despite the worldwide health crisis.
“Competition, firmly embedded in our DNA, represents a real technical on-hands workshop for our respective brands,” said Total strategy, marketing, and research director Philippe Montanteme. “We are coming back to endurance racing because we have the opportunity to work the sport in a different way,” added Jean-Philippe Imparato, chief exec of Peugeot.
Neither party is willing to spill the beans on the engine’s displacement or number of cylinders, but from the teaser photos before you, it’s easy to tell that we’re dealing with a mid-ship layout. The electric motor is capable of delivering 200 kW to the front axle, and the combined output is 500 kW.
In other words, 680 PS or 670 horsepower and electric all-wheel drive are in the pipeline. Peugeot also highlights that the LMH will be longer and wider than a Le Mans Prototype at 5 and 2 meters as opposed to 4.65 and 1.90 meters, but no word has been offered in regard to a production model.
You see, regulations mandate production-based powertrains but manufacturers also need to manufacture 25 identical series-production cars over the course of two years. The FIA may change regulations once more until 2022, but looking at the bigger picture, the possibility is rather slim.
Would you like Peugeot to offer a road-going hypercar? I certainly would.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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