The FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) held its “prologue” event at the Lusail circuit in Qatar on February 21st-22nd in preparation for the season-opening race at the same circuit this weekend. That race will cover 1,812km or 1,126 miles. The WEC prologue event is very similar to the IMSA “Roar Before the 24” event at Daytona, which allows teams to test on the same circuit that the opening race will be on.
As in 2024, BMW M Team WRT will represent the factory with two M Hybrid V8 entries in the Hypercar prototype class (called GTP in IMSA) and two M4 GT3 entries in the LMGT3 class (called GTD in IMSA). The #15 M Hybrid V8 will be driven by Dries Vanthoor, Raffaele Marciello, and Kevin Magnussen, while Sheldon van der Linde, Robin Frijns, and René Rast will drive the #20 M Hybrid V8. In LMGT3, the #31 M4 GT3 EVO will be piloted by Yasser Shahin, Timur Boguslavskiy, and works driver Augusto Farfus. The #46 M4 GT3 EVO will be shared by works drivers Valentino Rossi, Kelvin van der Linde, and Ahmad Al Harthy.
All in all, there are 18 entries apiece in both the Hypercar and LMGT3 classes, with eight manufacturers in Hypercar and nine in LMGT3. All four of the BMW entries will feature new liveries for the 2025 season, and the Qatar race will be the first race in WEC for the new M4 GT3 EVO (though it has competed in a few races already this season, including the Rolex 24 at Daytona). In the balance of performance adjustments coming into the Qatar prologue, the BMW M Hybrid V8 and Ferrari 499P were the lightest cars in the Hypercar field, but the BMWs have less base power than Peugeot, Alpine, or Porsche. In LMGT3, the M4 GT3 EVO is the lightest car in the field at 1,344kg, while the Corvette Z06 GT3.R is the heaviest at 1,374kg.
There were four test sessions in the Qatar prologue, and four different manufacturers set the fastest laps in each of the sessions in the Hypercar class, with the #20 M Hybrid V8 (shown in the top photo) going the fastest in session four and setting the fastest time overall (1:38.971), with Robin Frijns at the wheel. Prior to that session, the fastest BMW time was 1:41.330 in session three, so there were significant gains made between sessions three and four. “I think it went alright,” said Frijns. “We had a test program before arriving at Qatar, we followed it pretty much and everything feels fine. Now, we need to put the puzzle together and prepare ourselves for the race which is a bit different. As we don’t drive at night during FP1 and FP2, Saturday was our only opportunity so that was quite important for us. Now it’s all about discussions and see how we can improve the package we have for the race.”
The M4 GT3 EVOs were still getting up to speed over the course of the test sessions at Qatar. Their best performance was in session three, where the #46 was sixth fastest, but overall they were only tenth and eleventh fastest among the LMGT3 cars. “I think that we improved a lot from Friday to Saturday, and the feeling is not so bad,” said Valentino Rossi. “The tire consumption makes a big difference here, so we tried a lot of things to improve this aspect that was a bit difficult for us sometimes in the past. Overall, it is difficult to understand where we are at the moment. We need to wait for the race. We are not the fastest yet, we need to improve but we are on a good way.”
The Qatar race gets underway on Friday the 28th, and you can find out more information on the FIA WEC website. There are eight rounds in the FIA WEC season, with races in Italy, Belgium, France, Brazil, the USA and Japan in addition to the Middle East. The next race after Qatar will be the 6 Hours of Imola in Italy on April 20th, and the sole USA race is the Lone Star Le Mans event on September 7th at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. Of course, the marquis event on the calendar is the 24 Hours of Le Mans in France on June 14th-15th.
—David Haueter
[Photos courtesy BMW]
