The FIA World Endurance Championship schedule for 2020/21 has been announced.
The 8-race schedule consists of a lot of returnees, as well as two brand new tracks for the FIA WEC.
The season starts on 31 August and 1 September at Silverstone, with a two-day test. That’s on Monday and Tuesday, with the first race of the year to follow, later in the week.
One month later, we will visit the first new track – Monza, Italy. Monza was hosting the FIA WEC Prologue 2017, and has been hosting a European Le Mans Series race for a couple of years now.
The next stop is Fuji in Japan, before Bahrain has a December date once again.
Kyalami in South Africa is the second new track on the schedule and will be run early February. March 2021 will once again be Sebring, alongside the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.
Spa Francorchamps in April will be the last chance for the teams, to get the final details sorted out, prior to the season finale at Le Mans on 12-13 June 2021.
The 2019/20 saw the introduction of 4-hour races, but the minimum race distance will be 6 hours in 2020/21. The exceptions are once again an 8 hour race in Bahrain, plus 1000 Miles or max 8 hours at Sebring. Silverstone and Shanghai were just 4 hours in the current season, but that wasn’t to the liking of the teams and fans.
It’s a bit of surprise that China is no longer present. The country has been important for the car manufacturers, but the big feeling in the WEC paddock wasn’t too warm regarding China. What perhaps made the final blow for the event, was making it a 4-hour only race in November 2019, which many didn’t find worth it, taking VISA and Customs difficulties into account.
The 2020/21 season will be the debut for the brand new Hypercar regulations, which will replace LMP1 over time as the top category. LMP1 cars and Hypercars will compete side by side, thanks to Balance Of Performance, so both new and old, hybrid and non-hybrid cars can compete.
The schedule still has to be approved by the FIA World Motorsport Council, but that usually isn’t an issue, when a FIA World Championship announces their schedule.
The full schedule looks like this:
31 Aug/01 Sep 2020 Pre-Season Test, Silverstone (Great Britain)
05 September 2020 6 Hours of Silverstone (Great Britain)
04 October 2020 6 Hours of Monza (Italy)
01 November 2020 6 Hours of Fuji (Japan)
05 December 2020 8 Hours of Bahrain (Bahrain)
06 February 2021 6 Hours of Kyalami (South Africa)
19 March 2021 1000 Miles of Sebring (8 hours) (USA)
24 April 2021 TOTAL 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps (Belgium)
12-13 June 2021 24 Hours of Le Mans (France)