A need to maximise seat time for the common drivers of its 2024-spec 9X8 Le Mans Hypercar, which is making solely its second race outing previous to subsequent month’s Le Mans 24 Hours, was cited by technical director Olivier Jansonnie as a justification for not giving reserve Malthe Jakobsen a WEC race debut.
“We’re searching for stability in our crew, mainly, attempting to ensure that we maximise the driving time for the drivers going to Le Mans afterwards, that was the one factor for us,” Jansonnie stated, when requested by Autosport to elucidate its method.
“We’ve been giving driving time in testing to Malthe, I feel it was all very Positive.
“Now coming to Le Mans, getting ready for the race, it was good for us to have this sort of repeat, even when it’s solely with two drivers.”
Jansonnie rejected the view that not utilising Asian Le Mans Collection champion Jakobsen may imply he’s unprepared if referred to as upon for Le Mans, the place he’s scheduled to race for Cool Racing in LMP2.
“Personally, [I think] he’s prepared for nearly each race,” he stated.
Photograph by: Peugeot Sport
Jakobsen defined that he accepted the group’s choice.
“In fact, I’m a racing driver and I desire to be sitting in a race automobile with the steering wheel between my arms,” he stated.
“However I perceive the group’s significance of preserving the group surroundings and the group spirit with a brand-new automobile and to arrange themselves as greatest as potential for the 24 Hours of Le Mans which is the large goal for everyone on this sport and particularly the group as effectively.
“I nonetheless really feel like I’m prepared, in any other case I don’t suppose they’d have given me the chance to be a reserve driver as a result of it implies that if sooner or later one of many drivers received’t be able to drive, I must step in.”
Jansonnie stated that Spa can be “fascinating for us to experiment this sort of two drivers scenario” as he anticipates there will likely be extra situations sooner or later when clashes come up “simply because merely there are increasingly races”.
“You’re simply growing extra variables it’s important to play with [having] three drivers, so it ought to be a bit simpler,” he stated.
#93 Peugeot Totalenergies Peugeot 9X8: Mikkel Jensen, Nico Muller, Jean-Eric Vergne
Photograph by: Paolo Belletti
“And within the race, we’ll see, it actually relies on the variety of stints we’ll have within the race.
“If we maintain the race to 6 stints, it’s in all probability simple, should you begin doing seven stints then we’ll should scratch our heads and see how we do this with the drivers.”