At Porsche’s annual motorsport celebration dubbed Night of Champions last week, the company announced the name of its new Le Mans prototype, as the 919 hybrid.
The 919 hybrid marks Porsche’s return to high-level endurance racing after a 15-year hiatus (With the exception of the marque’s GT efforts). The name, of course, pays homage to the 917 race car that started Porsche’s dominance in endurance racing when it first won at Le Mans in 1970 through the efforts of Hans Herrmann and Richard Attwood, but also means it demonstrates lineage with the new 918 road-going hypercar.
There are no other details on the 919 hybrid, but as its name suggests it will utilize two energy recovery systems to supplement its turbocharged, direct injection four-cylinder motor.
Porsche also announced its full driver line-up for the 2014 World Endurance Championship (WEC), which along with F1 veteran Mark Webber, Neel Jani, Timo Bernhard and Romain Dumas, will include new signing Brendon Hartley (24) from New Zealand and long-time Porsche works driver Marc Lieb (33) from Germany.
“The vehicle name 919 hybrid follows on from the tradition of the Le Mans-winning 917, but it is also with a view to the 918 Spyder, and acknowledges the company’s embarkation into the hybrid future. Maximum efficiency in energy consumption is the directive of the new WEC regulations for the works-entered class 1 prototypes, and that is also the direction for the automobile future,” says Porsche R&D head Wolfgang Hatz.
