2020 24 Hours of Le Mans

It’s fair to say that this year’s racing calendar hasn’t exactly gone to plan. That’s why we’re about to settle down for one of our favorite 24 hours of racing of the year in mid-September — for the first time since 1968 — rather than its more common summer time slot.

Probably the most spectacular and ambitious race of this year’s unexpectedly virtual motorsports season is about to get underway. The first official 24 Hours of Le Mans Virtual will see the French flag drop at 1300 UTC on June 3, getting a full day of digital racing underway.

Like so much of this year’s motorsport, the 24 Hours of Le Mans has fallen to the unusual global conditions. The event will still run, albeit in September, but the race’s governing body, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO), has opted to stage a virtual event to run in its original June calendar slot.

The organizer of the 24 Hours of Le Mans has announced that it will stage this year’s race, for the first time, entirely in the digital realm. Going by the name “24 Hours of Le Mans Virtual”, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) says it will be the biggest esports endurance race ever seen.

The coronavirus outbreak continues to have an adverse effect on the motorsport calendar in 2020. Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) has now confirmed that the 88th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans is the latest event on the shelf, as efforts to curb the spread of the disease continue to ramp up.

The governing body of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) will shake up next year’s race yet with a new two-stage qualifying format. It replaces the three-session qualifying we’ve seen in recent years, as the top-class LMP1 cars make their final appearance.