One F1 driver reveals dream to race at 24 Hours of Le Mans with McLaren

Formula 1 race winner Oscar Piastri has revealed his ambition to race for outright victory at the Le Mans 24 Hours with McLaren.

Last week, McLaren announced that it would return to the top echelon of endurance racing in 2027 with a new LMDh programme in the World Endurance Championship.

The exact details about the project, including the driver line-up, will be revealed at a later date, but there is already some curiosity about McLaren potentially giving a shot to one of its F1 or IndyCar drivers.

One contender could be Piastri, whose manager Mark Webber raced for Mercedes and Porsche in sportscar racing at either end of his grand prix career.

Asked if he fancies a crack at the French endurance classic, Piastri said: “One day, but not for a while. I'm pretty happy in F1 at the moment.”

Piastri suggested that Le Mans will be a consideration for him once he has achieved his primary goals in F1, which likely includes winning the drivers’ championship.
 
Asked if it would be possible to contest Le Mans while actively racing in F1, the Australian replied: “I don’t think so.

“I don’t think you do either championship justice by trying to juggle both. It’s probably not that detrimental to the F1 championship, but when you’ve got a lot at stake, as we do right now….and also just not giving Le Mans the respect it deserves from a preparation standpoint, that’s not something you want to go into being underprepared.

“So I'll wait until I’m done with what I want to do in F1 and then I’ll think about letting Zak give me a burn in a Le Mans one.”

McLaren Racing boss Zak Brown said he had already spoken to Piastri and Lando Norris about potentially racing at Le Mans in an LMDh prototype and was happy to learn they were both enthusiastic about the idea.

“I love the old school racing, the Mario Andrettis, Dan Gurneys, they ran in different formulas,” Brown said during the broadcast of the Qatar WEC race.

“Now with how big the sport is corporately, you get into manufacturer conflicts, sponsor conflicts, calendar conflicts, and that’s why I loved racing with Fernando [Alonso] so much. Whether it’s Le Mans, Indy or Dakar, he just wants to race.

“But I think we are very open-minded. Who doesn’t want to win Le Mans? I’ve talked to Lando and Oscar about it, and they’ve said they’d love to go race, Le Mans. That’s cool, right? I think all these motorsports converging are great.”

A number of F1 stars have raced at Le Mans in recent years, including Webber, Fernando Alonso, Nico Hulkenberg and Jenson Button.

In the eight out of the last 10 years, the winning crew had at least one driver who had previously raced in F1.