On the 13 April 2013 the first European Le Mans Series race organised by Le Mans Endurance Management (LMEM) was run at Silverstone, with Simon Dolan and Oliver Turvey winning the 3-hour race for JOTA Sport. Over the past 10 years 56 races have been held on 10 of Europe’s top circuits in 8 different countries.
Le Castellet is the only circuit to have hosted a round in all ten seasons and, in fact, has held 11 races since 2013. This is due to two visits in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic when Barcelona was unable to host the round because of travel restrictions in Spain at the time. Silverstone, Red Bull Ring and Spa-Francorchamps have hosted seven races each, Portimao and Monza six races, Imola five races, Estoril and Barcelona three races and Hungaroring one.
At the end of 2012 LMEM was invited by the ACO to organise the 2013 European Le Mans Series, which was five 3-hour races at Silverstone, Imola, Red Bull Ring, Hungaroring and Le Castellet. Twenty-three cars were on the grid for the first race at Silverstone across the four classes – LMP2, LMGTE, LMPC and GTC.
Proton Competition won the LMGTE category at Silverstone, with Christian Ried, Gianluca Roda and Nick Tandy standing on the top step of the podium. Christian Ried is also the only driver on the current grid to have taken part in all 56 races held over the past 10 years.
At the end of the 2013 season, Signatech Alpine, Nelson Panciatici and Pierre Ragues became the first LMP2 champions of the new ELMS era. Matt Griffin and Johnny Mowlem took the LMGTE title for RAM Racing, Paul Loup Chatin and Gary Hirsch were LMPC Champions and Fabio Babini, Kirill Ladygin and Viktor Shaitar were GTC champion.
34 cars scored points in 2013 – 11 LMP2 / 9 LMGTE / 4 LMPC / 10 GTC
In 2014 the races were increased to four hours and the LMPC category was dropped.Silverstone, Imola, Red Bull Ring and Le Castellet remained on the five-race calendar. Hungaroring was replaced by Estoril, with the Portuguese round becoming the season finale.Nelson Panciatici and Signatech Alpine retained their LMP2 titles, with Paul Loup Chatin and Oliver Webb.
Andrea Bertolini, Victor Shaitar and Sergey Zlobin won the LMGTE category, with their teammates Olivier Beretta, Anton Ladygin and David Markosov winning GTC.
45 cars scored points in 2014 – 11 LMP2 / 16 LMGTE / 18 GTC
2015 marked the debut of the LMP3 category and the final season of GTC. The calendar was unchanged from 2014 with Silverstone, Imola, Red Bull Ring, Le Castellet and Estoril hosting the races.
Bjorn Wirdheim, Jon Lancaster and Gary Hirsch won the LMP2 title with Greaves Motorsport, Johnny Laursen, Mikkel Mac and Andrea Rizzoli won the LMGTE title with Formula Racing, while British cycling superstar Sir Chris Hoy added the LMP3 crown to his glittering array of Olympic gold medals and cycling world titles alongside fellow Brit Charlie Robertson. Dino Lunardi, Eric Dermont and Franck Perera were the final recipients of the GTC title with TDS Racing.
40 cars scored points in 2015 – 16 LMP2 / 10 LMGTE / 7 LMP3 / 7 GTC
2016 saw a further change to the ELMS calendar with Spa-Francorchamps being added for the first time, bringing the ELMS up to six 4-hour races for the first time.
Simon Dolan added a second LMP2 title to his CV alongside Giedo Ven Der Garde and Harry Tincknell.The LMGTE crown went to Andrew Howard, Darren Turner and Alex MacDowall with Aston Martin Racing, with United Autosports claiming the LMP3 crown with Alex Brundle, Christian England and Michael Guasch.
46 cars scored points in 2016 – 16 LMP2 / 9 LMGTE / 21 LMP3
The calendar changed in 2017 with Monza replacing Imola for the Italian race and Portimao replacing Estoril for the season finale, while Silverstone, Red Bull Ring, Le Castellet and Spa-Francorchamps were retained.
Leo Roussel and Memo Rojas won the LMP2 crown, Jody Fannin and Robert Smith won the LMGTE title with JMW Motorsport and United Autosports retained their LMP3 crown with John Falb and Sean Rayhall.
37 cars scored points in 2017 – 13 LMP2 / 7 LMGTE / 17 LMP3
2018 saw the same six circuits as 2017 retained, with Le Castellet hosting the opening round, swapping with Silverstone, which now hosted round 4.
Roman Rusinov and Andrea Pizzitola won the LMP2 category, father and son duo Gianluca and Giorgio Roda won LMGTE for Proton Competition and RLR MSport won LMP3 with Job Van Uitert, John Farano and Rob Garofall.
47 cars scored points in 2018 – 19 LMP2 / 8 LMGTE / 20 LMP3
2019 saw one change to the calendar with Barcelona replacing Red Bull Ring, the Spanish circuit hosting round 3 of the 2019 season.
IDEC Sport won the LMP2 title with Memo Rojas and Paul Loup Chatin securing their second LMP2 titles alongside Paul Lafargue. Luzich Racing took the LMGTE title with Alessandro Pier Guidi, Nicklas Nielsen and Fabien Lavergne. The LMP3 title was secured by Eurointernational with Jens Petersen and Mikkel Jensen at the final race of the season in Portugal.
43 cars scored points in 2019 – 19 LMP2 / 9 LMGTE / 15 LMP3
2020 saw the calendar reduced to five races due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, with Le Castellet becoming the first circuit in ELMS history to host two races in the same season.It was also a record breaking season for Phil Hanson, Filipe Albuquerque and United Autosports, who became the first to win the ELMS, the WEC and the 24 Hours of Le Mans LMP2 titles in the same season.
The LMGTE title was secured by Proton Competition with Christian Ried, Alessio Picariello and Michele Beretta winning by the closest margin ever. The German team was tied on 99 points with Kessel Racing, with the two teams having exactly the same two wins, two seconds, one fourth and a pole position. Proton Competition was awarded the title by the fact they had won the first race of the season in Le Castellet.
United Autosports secured their third LMP3 crown with Tom Gamble, Wayne Boyd and Rob Wheldon.
35 cars scored points in 2020 – 15 LMP2 / 8 LMGTE / 12 LMP3
2021 saw the calendar return to six rounds with Red Bull Ring returning alongside Barcelona, Le Castellet, Monza, Spa-Francorchamps and Portimao.2021 also saw the introduction of the LMP2 Pro/Am category.
Team WRT secured the LMP2 title in their debut season, with Louis Deletraz, Yifei Ye and Robert Kubica winning the drivers title on their first attempt. John Falb and Rui Andrade won the first LMP2 Pro/Am title, while Matteo Cressoni, Miguel Molina and Rino Mastronardi won LMGTE for Iron Lynx.
The 2021 LMP3 title was won by Laurents Hörr for four-time Michelin Le Mans Cup winning team DKR Engineering.
46 cars scored points in 2021 – 21 LMP2 / 9 LMGTE / 16 LMP3
The 2022 season saw Imola return to the calendar, with Monza making it two trips to Italy that season after Hungaroring was replaced by the Temple of Speed on the schedule.
2022 season also saw two new records set by ELMS drivers, with Malthe Jakobsen becoming the first driver to secure six pole positions from six attempts in a single season in any class and Mikkel Jensen becoming the first driver to win an ELMS race in LMP2, LMP3 and LMGTE, when he stood on the top step of the LMGTE podium at the end of the 4 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps.
Also, a record breaking season was topped off when the first ELMS victory by an all-female crew was established when the Iron Dames crew of Doriane Pin, Michelle Gatting and Sarah Bovy won the LMGTE class in Portimao.
Prema Racing became the second team to win the LMP2 title in their debut season, with Louis Deletraz also securing his second title alongside Ferdinand Habsburg.The LMGTE title was won by Proton Competition for the third time in five years with Christian Ried, Gianmaria Bruni and Lorenzo Ferrari.
The LMP2 Pro/Am crown was won by Racing Team Turkey and Salih Yoluc and Charlie Eastwood and the LMP3 title went to Cool Racing in a dramatic final round in Portugal, with Malthe Jakobsen, Maurice Smith and Michael Benham celebrating on the podium.
42 cars scored points in 2022 – 17 LMP2 / 12 LMGTE / 13 LMP3
