[ELMS] ELMS (was LMS) 2012 discussion

[JAG]

As a side note, I thought we had a glorious period of sports car racing in the late 90's without any championship and without some of the cornerstone races even. Porsche, Toyota, Nissan, Audi, BMW, Mercedes, the McLarens, and so forth. Some of those entries competed for championships, but not all. Yeah, that period busted too, but so did the glorious period in the early 1990s with two previously "strong" championships. So, in other words, I don't think this championship guarantees anything, but the potential for success appears to be there. It just seems to me that the FiaACO are building some cracks into the ship they are trying to build here.

The mid-'90's were exciting with the F1 GTR's, F40's and such, but by early '97 it was clear this class of racing only had a couple of years to run, there was a split between FIA/ACO rules (GT-ONE etc. weren't allowed in FIA GT), and by the time the FIA Prototype Championship was proposed for '99, most had left for F1 or the ALMS.

Oh, Peter's firing of their ACO "partners" makes a lot of sense when you consider that it is rumored that the ACO did not even let the ALMS know about the Petit date conflict until it was announced. What a partner. It's nice to see that Patrick Peter does not suffer from Battered Wife Syndrome.

The LMS remains affiliated with the ACO, LMS teams will also be given priority for remaining places at WEC races. The ALMS has the same options as the LMS, it's the ALMS who chose to restrict GTC to one make, they chose to leave their LMP classes as is, they have double the rounds of it's Euro equivalent and very different goals, they are just so very different.

Even if PLM was on the WEC schedule there'd be twelve months discussing which teams will be turned away, with more entries expected than this year, it would be more than just LMPC's and GTC's not competing, something Peter didn't want to do in his series. When it comes down to it, there are too many cars to have joint events at most circuits, if the ALMS had literally a handful more quality season long LMP entries, WEC teams wouldn't be missed.