Bentley returning to 24 Hours of Le Mans

Autoweek is reporting that Bentley has recruited the designer of the 1999 Le Mans 24 Hour-winning BMW as it gears up for a return to motorsports.

The British luxury-car maker has hired Graham Humphrys, who was responsible for the design of the BMW V12 LMR at Williams Motorsport, as a consultant to undertake a feasibility study into the options open to it. He joins a project that includes John Wickham, who was team director at Bentley 10 years ago.

Bentley chassis and powertrain director Brian Gush, whose responsibilities also include motorsport, said, “Graham is helping us out with the feasibility work; he has a lot of experience in both GT and prototypes.”

Humphrys has extensive sports-car experience dating back 30 years. He undertook the mechanical design on the March 82G Group C car, was chief designer at Spice Engineering from 1985 to 1991 and worked at Aston Martin for nearly 10 years as its chief motorsports engineer.

Gush reiterated his previous comments that Bentley is considering a number of options for its return to racing.

“We are looking at a number of things, quite a few of them GT classes and other classes as well,” he said, “but it is important to stress that no decisions have been made.”

Gush last year expressed his desire to return to the prototype ranks, but he has now suggested that the complexity of the 2014 Le Mans rule book, which has been released to teams and manufacturers in draft form, could prevent that.

Bentley boss Wolfgang Dürheimer, who also heads up motorsports for the entire Volkswagen Group, is known to favor a Bentley return in the GT ranks. He has also raised the idea of Bentley selling race cars to customers.

Sources suggest that the most likely route for Bentley's return to the track would be in the GT3 category. This would be the best fit for its existing model range, which does not have a car suitable to take on Ferrari, Porsche and Chevrolet in the top-flight GTE division.

 

Hardly makes sense when Audi is still competing ... but hey.

 

Yes

 

Can you imagine that company dinner after Le Mans?

 

GT Class car? So they're thinking of building a Conti GT for that class?

Going to have to shave a ton of weight to make that thing competitive.

 

Can you imagine Bentley Audi Porsche and Aston all vying for the overall victory!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!