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I'm dead sure that if the Le Mans Series had not banned LMP1 after 2011, the privateer situation would've remained far better than it is now - where they are forced to run "for the rest" positions in hyper expensive world championship. Of course right now their availability is so low that any grid made of them would be low, but you need to start somewhere. Cheaper option to run P1 cars on top of Le Mans would surely be welcomed. If the ACO re-established P1 for ELMS next - which they obviously won't but let's pretend - for sure you'd have at least one Rebellion for full season (they've said many times overall wins are what they're after ie also the idea beyond running in the ALMS), Lotus maybe, Oak maybe (if they got the funding) and so on. It'd be a rocky start with small car count but it's not like ELMS is relatively high profile series as it's US counterpart is - or rather was. It would improve in time.
LMP2 would essentially downgrade as division 2 again and yes you could lose a few cars because of that maybe, but if you look at the ELMS P2 grid numbers it's not like they're magically bigger than they were in the pre-headliner class period anyway. I don't think the health of that class is based on being a headliner (because ELMS is a very minor series anyway that no-one but diehards care about, incl media) but because the cost cop formula is successful in itself and running in Europe is cheaper than in world championship.
It would also be nice to see LMP1, LMP2 and the new LMP3 running together. Just because it's an regional series doesn't mean it has to be "feeder series" which I think is what ACO wants to label it as. Especially as most of the teams goal is never to even aim for WEC but rather just compete in ELMS and hope for LM invite.
And as for P2 BoP, they haven't updated those sheets in couple of years now unlike with the other classes, and even before it was really engine vs engine BoP, not chassis vs chassis. The open top HPD has an restrictor break for example but nothing too bad otherwise IIRC
Last edited by Deleted; 23 Oct 2014 at 15:46.
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