In July 2014 the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) announced a new Le Mans Prototype category (LMP3) in a press conference at the 4 Hours of Red Bull Ring. The first race was held at Silverstone in April 2015 with seven cars as full season entries and 2024 marks the 10th season with LMP3, once again, forming an important part of the overall grid.
As the only manufacturer ready at the start of the year, Ginetta was the dominant force in the first season, winning all five races. Ligier made its racing debut at the final race of the 2015 season, the Graff entered JS P3 finishing second in the 4 Hours of Estoril.
The following season, as the only manufacturer, Ligier took 18 out of 18 podium positions in the six races with United Autosports taking their first of three LMP3 championships.
2017 saw Norma enter the ELMS with two teams running the M30 chassis. The first win came in round 2 at Monza for the no19 M.Racing YMR, which was followed by a second place finish at Spa for the no7 Duqueine Engineering entered Norma.United Autosports won the title with Americans John Falb and Sean Rayhall in a Ligier.
Ligier continued to dominate the podium in 2018 and 2019, with RLR MSport and Eurointernational taking the titles in the respective years.
In 2020 Norma became Duqueine with the M30-D08 taking second at Spa that year.In 2021the first of four ELMS wins for the manufacturer came at Le Castellet in the hands of DKR Engineering.Two more wins at Monza and Spa followed to secure the first title for Duqueine, DKR Engineering and Laurents Hörr.
COOL Racing won back-to-back titles with the Ligier JS P320 in 2022 and 2023, with 11 wins from 12 starts throughout the two seasons, the only win for Duqueine coming in Portugal in the 2023 season finale.
LMP3 Races Held since 2015– 52
First winner of an ELMS LMP3 Race - #3 Team LNT Ginetta-Nissan - Sir Chris Hoy / Charlie Robertson - Silverstone 11/04/2015
First Win for Ligier - #2 United Autosports Ligier JS P3-Nissan – Alex Brundle / Mike Guasch / Christian England – Silverstone 16/04/2016
First Win for Norma - #19 M.Racing-YMR Norma M30-Nissan – Ricky Capo / Erwin Creed – Monza 14/05/2017
First Win for Duqueine - #4 DKR Engineering Duqueine M30-D08-Nissan – Laurents Hörr / Jean-Philippe Dayraut – Le Castellet 06/06/2021
YEAR | DRIVERS | TEAM | MANUFACTURER |
2015 | Sir Chris Hoy / Charlie Robertson | Team LNT | Ginetta |
2016 | Alex Brundle / Mike Guasch / Christian England | United Autosports | Ligier |
2017 | John Falb / Sean Rayhall | United Autosports | Ligier |
2018 | Job Van Uitert / John Farano / Rob Garofall | RLR MSport | Ligier |
2019 | Jens Petersen / Mikkel Jensen | Eurointernational | Ligier |
2020 | Wayne Boyd / Tom Gamble / Rob Wheldon | United Autosports | Ligier |
2021 | Laurents Hörr | DKR Engineering | Duqueine |
2022 | Malthe Jakobsen / Maurice Smith / Michael Benham | COOL Racing | Ligier |
2023 | Marcos Siebert / Alejandro Garcia / Adrien Chila | COOL Racing | Ligier |
TEAM | Number of LMP3 Wins | Championships |
United Autosports | 12 | 3 |
COOL Racing | 7 | 2 |
Inter Europol Competition | 7 | 0 |
Eurointernational | 6 | 1 |
Team LNT | 4 | 1 |
DKR Engineering | 3 | 1 |
RLR MSport | 2 | 1 |
M.Racing-YMR | 2 | 0 |
Graff | 2 | 0 |
WTM by Rinaldi Racing17 | 1 | 0 |
Racing Spirit of Leman | 1 | 0 |
Realteam Racing | 1 | 0 |
Ultimate | 1 | 0 |
360 Racing | 1 | 0 |
AT Racing | 1 | 0 |
University of Bolton | 1 | 0 |
MANUFACTURER | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | Championships |
Ligier | 41 | 40 | 43 | 7 |
Duqueine | 4 | 5 | 2 | 1 |
Norma | 2 | 3 | 2 | 0 |
Ginetta | 5 | 4 | 5 | 1 |
