JOTA Sport is back

The JOTA Sport outfit will return under their own name, when the FIA World Endurance Championship 2019/20 season starts.

The team has at least sent in an application, subject to approval, of running a ORECA 07 Gibson LMP2 car, which they have a lot of experience with already.

They have raced under different names during the last three seasons. In 2016 it was G-Drive Racing in the ELMS, while it has been Jackie Chan DC Racing since 2017.

The plan is to start the upcoming season with Anthony Davidson, Pastor Maldonado and Roberto Gonzalez behind the wheel. The three drivers currently race at DragonSpeed, who most likely won’t return for next year. DragonSpeed already confirmed that they wouldn’t race their LMP1 car but instead focus on IndyCar and the European Le Mans Series.

Other than the FIA WEC programme, we also have JOTA Sport running the R-Motorsport programme in the Blancpain Endurance Series, so they are quite busy.

Roberto Gonzalez has a couple of seasons of experience in the FIA WEC, racing for Manor in LMP2 before switching to DragonSpeed. His older brother Ricardo has also raced in the category, but is currently taking care of the more business related part of his life, while he also was the promoter for the FIA WEC rounds in Mexico in the past.

Pastor Maldonado, Roberto Gonzalez, Anthony Davidson
Photo: JJ Media

Anthony Davidson is becoming a bit of a veteran in sportscar racing. He did do Formula 1 a couple of times, but has raced GT1 cars, Peugeot Diesel LMP1 and most recently, Toyota Gazoo Racing LMP1 cars. There wasn’t however room for him in the Super Season 2018/19, so when Le Mans 2018 had concluded, he was allowed to go an play with DragonSpeed in LMP2, where he has been a very important part alongside Maldonado.

Pastor Maldonado is concluding his first season in sportscars at Le Mans. The former Formula 1 driver – and winner – switched to this kind of racing, when he no longer was able to find a seat in F1, partly because the cash flow from his Venezuelan sponsors wasn’t able to flow quite a freely as previously. A lot of people had doubts when he made the switch, because of his quite unfortunate reputation from F1, but he has done really well in the FIA WEC, doing fast an consistent laptimes, which is expected from a Platinum ranked driver.

Gonzalez and Maldonado currently sit third in the Drivers Championship, but they have 26 points up to first position, with 37 possible points. Davidson isn’t part of this fight because, as we described earlier, he wasn’t a part of the team from the start of the season. The points gap of 26 points means that the team has so finish second at worst  – and both Jackie Chan DC Racing #38 (Ironically) and Signatech Alpine Matmut #36 have to retire from the race, since they are sure of getting at least 12 points, as long as they finish the race.

But it is Le Mans, and it’s 24 hours – and if you don’t cross the finish line, you get zero points. So nothing is decided yet.

Jackie Chan DC Racing is expected to stay in the FIA WEC for 2019/20, but plans are yet to be confirmed regarding one or two cars, and what team will operate them.

The 24 Hours of Le Mans will run in exactly two weeks from today – on 15-16 June 2019.

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