The Oreca 01 is a Le Mans Prototype built by Oreca Racing in 2009. It is to replace the

Courage Courage (also called bravery or valor) is the choice and willingness to confront agony, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. Valor is courage or bravery, especially in battle. Physical courage is bravery in the face of physical pain, h ...

- Oreca LC70 raced previously by Oreca. It is powered by an engine from Japanese engine company AIM Power. It is a tuned Judd engine that develops 650 bhp 485 kW, all of which is available at 8000 rpm.

Racing

2009

Team Oreca Matmut-AIM debuted two Oreca 01's at the

2009 1000 km of Spa 9 (nine) is the natural number following and preceding . Evolution of the Arabic digit In the beginning, various Indians wrote a digit 9 similar in shape to the modern closing question mark without the bottom dot. The Kshatrapa, Andhra and ...

, the second round of the

2009 Le Mans Series season The 2009 Le Mans Series was the sixth season of Automobile Club de l'Ouest's Le Mans Series. It was contested over five events between 5 April and 13 September 2009. Aston Martin Racing trio Jan Charouz, Tomáš Enge and Stefan Mücke finished ev ...

. It started off well with the #10 car qualifying fourth place. Unfortunately, Bruno Senna, driving the #10 car had a huge crash after completing 129 of the race winners 143 laps. The accident damage looked identical to the other #10 driver Stéphane Ortelli's crash at the

2008 1000 km of Monza The 2008 1000 km of Monza was the second round of the 2008 Le Mans Series season. It took place at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, Italy, on 27 April 2008. This event was the last. Monégasque driver Stéphane Ortelli was injured in an in ...

which put him out of the running for the

2008 24 Hours of Le Mans The 2008 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 76th Grand Prix of Endurance, taking place on 14–15 June 2008 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, Le Mans, France, organised by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO). The test day was on June 1. The race was atten ...

. Luckily, the #11 car did finish, in fourth place getting five points. At the

2009 24 Hours of Le Mans The 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans (french: 24 Heures du Mans 2009) was the 77th Grand Prix of Endurance, an endurance auto race run over 24 hours. It took place at the Circuit de la Sarthe, Le Mans, France, and was organised by the Automobile Club ...

, the #11 car finished 5th. The #10 did not finish, dropping out after 219 laps.

2010

A single Oreca 01 was entered in the

2010 24 Hours of Le Mans The 78th 24 Hours of Le Mans (French: ''78e 24 Heures du Mans'') was a non-championship 24-hour automobile endurance race for Le Mans Prototype (LMP) and Grand Touring (GT) cars held from 12 to 13 June 2010 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, near Le ...

alongside a

Peugeot 908 HDi FAP The Peugeot 908 HDi FAP is a sports prototype racing car built by the French automobile manufacturer Peugeot to compete in the 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race, starting in 2007 and eventually winning in 2009. This effort, in development sin ...

, qualifying with a time of 3:29.506, putting it in 10th place. Despite the Lola-Aston Martins being favoured to win the "petrol" P1 class all 3 of them as well as all 4 Peugeots suffered reliability issues, the Oreca 01 was able to take an impressive 4th place overall, highest petrol-fuel finisher and behind only the 3 factory Audis.

2011

2011 saw the Oreca 01 raced by Swiss team

Hope Racing Morand Racing is an auto racing team founded by former racing driver Benoît Morand and based in Marly, Switzerland. The team traces its origins to 2000 when Morand founded PoleVision Racing which competed in numerous open-wheel series before sw ...

as a hybrid-powered vehicle at

Le Mans Le Mans (, ) is a city in northwestern France on the Sarthe River where it meets the Huisne. Traditionally the capital of the province of Maine, it is now the capital of the Sarthe department and the seat of the Roman Catholic diocese of Le Man ...

, using the KERS system featured in Formula One and powered by a Volkswagen-based 2 litre engine. The engine is significantly smaller than the AIM ( Judd) V10 engine used before in the 01 as there were changes made to the regulations for the 2011 season. The Oreca 01 did not finish, retiring after 115 laps.

External links

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Technical Specs
Le Mans Prototypes 24 Hours of Le Mans race cars Sports prototypes