In 21st-century endurance racing, no manufacturer has been more dominant than Audi. When the open-topped R8 LMP1 debuted in 2000, it paved the way for an astounding 13 Le Mans victories and numerous other endurance-racing wins. Corporate sibling Porsche reentered prototype endurance racing in 2014, and now it could be edging Audi out.
That’s according to a report from the German publication Auto Motor und Sport, which says Audi will pull its LMP1 racers out of the World Endurance Championship (WEC) after 2017. Britain’s Autocar also cites anonymous Audi insiders that say there’s an end in sight for the company’s LMP1 program.
A mountain of evidence supports these reports. Audi’s WEC withdrawal is said to be a result of cost cutting following Volkswagen’s increasingly expensive diesel-emissions scandal. Both the Volkswagen and Audi brands are hinging their futures on an onslaught of electric cars planned to hit the market within the next decade. The push toward electrification will require significant R&D spending, and Audi’s LMP1 program stands directly in the way of that. There’s also Audi’s LMP1 engine, which is, in the current R18, awkwardly a diesel-powered 4.0-liter V-6. When Audi debuted its first diesel-engined Le Mans racer in 2006, the R10 TDI, the brand sought to push diesel technology. After the fallout of VW’s scandal, though, diesel power is looking increasingly obsolete, and in any case, VW wa...