BMW will return to the WEC and Le Mans in 2024 with a hybrid V8 hypercar

For the first time in nearly a quarter century, BMW will return to European endurance racing, bringing the M Motorsport livery back to storied tracks like Circuit de la Sarthe, Spa-Francorchamps, Monza, Sebring and Fuji Speedway. And also to Bahrain.

Presuming that the 2024 WEC season follows the current calendar, the M Hybrid V8 will make its series debut at Sebring in March of that year. But if you’re already stateside, you can see its racing debut as soon as January 2023 in Daytona. And yes, that does mean going to Florida, so take that into consideration.

When the M Hybrid V8 does turn a wheel in anger, it’ll apparently show “how exciting electrified BMW M cars will be in the future”. Give us an M car that looks and goes like this one, BMW, and we’ll get amped for... um, amps.

That said, given that it’s already turned its wheels in... um, general frustration (wow, that idiom falls apart almost immediately) around Autodromo Varano – under the watchful eye of Giampaolo Dallara, no less – it’s clear BMW’s already at the testing and tweaking stage for its first Le Mans racer since David Brent was still on TV.

After a gap that long, you’d be forgiven for thinking BMW’s going to take a few tentative steps into long-distance racing, find its bearings and then mount a challenge. You’d still be wrong, mind, given that the CEO of BMW’s M Division has said he’s “very excited to be challenging for overall victory". As long as it may have been between races, BMW’s clearly already thinking about maximum distance.