Cadillac Racing returns to the Circuit de la Sarthe on June 13-14 for the 94th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans with three V-Series.R prototypes, a revised aero package, and nine drivers who have collectively logged 11 Le Mans wins across four classes.
Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA brings two entries from the FIA World Endurance Championship. The No. 12 car, driven by Will Stevens, Norman Nato, and Louis Deletraz, won at Le Mans in 2025 after securing pole position. The No. 38 car fields Sebastien Bourdais, Earl Bamber, and Jack Aitken. Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing, which runs the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship program, enters the No. 101 car driven by Ricky Taylor, Jordan Taylor, and Filipe Albuquerque. Wayne Taylor Racing’s 2025 Le Mans debut ended after 12 hours with an engine failure.
The aero configuration for 2026 lowers the rear wing height compared to the 2025 V-Series.R and introduces brake hardware that aligns suppliers and technology with the Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing road car. Chief engineer Jeromy Moore framed the wing change as a traffic solution: the redesigned aero package improves the car’s ability to follow closely with less downforce loss than the previous configuration. Le Mans runs on public roads closed for the event, and traffic management matters because slower GT cars populate every lap.
Moore noted that the homologation window set by the FIA, ACO, and IMSA prevents track-specific bodywork configurations, so the Le Mans aero is the WEC season aero. The team optimized for Le Mans with mechanical setup adjustments that favor straight-line speed while maintaining cornering pace through the high-speed Porsche Curves. The Circuit de la Sarthe’s 13.6-kilometer layout includes two long straights that make drag a primary consideration, but lap time gains come from handling traffic rather than outright top speed.
Five of the nine drivers have won at Le Mans. Filipe Albuquerque won in LMP2 in 2020. Earl Bamber won overall in 2015 and 2017. Sebastien Bourdais won LMGTE Pro in 2016. Will Stevens won LMP2 in 2022 and LMGTE Am in 2017. Ricky Taylor won GTE Pro in 2015. Albuquerque, who returns to Le Mans for the 13th time, said the goal is to run trouble-free at the pre-test and work through the car’s steering-wheel settings across the 13.6-kilometer track. Jordan Taylor, who made his prototype-class Le Mans debut in 2025, said the Wayne Taylor Racing team is better prepared after a year to digest what they learned during last year’s two-week event.
Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA tested at Silverstone in mid-May to prepare for Le Mans. The team finished fourth in the 2025 WEC Hypercar manufacturers’ championship and won in Brazil in July, where the No. 12 car took the win and the No. 38 car finished second. Cadillac Wayne Taylor Racing is nearly two years into a winless drought in IMSA. Albuquerque said the extra race preparation for Le Mans should help break that streak.
Cadillac Racing swept the front row at Le Mans in 2025, the first American manufacturer to do so since 1967. The pole was Cadillac’s first at Le Mans, 75 years after the brand’s first appearance at the race in 1950. The No. 12 car finished fourth and the No. 38 car finished seventh. The No. 101 Wayne Taylor Racing entry and the No. 311 Whelen Cadillac V-Series.R both retired.
The question this year is whether the aero revisions and brake updates produce the consistency to run 24 hours without the mechanical failures that ended two of the four Cadillac entries in 2025. The track surface is kinder to tires than most circuits because of the long straights, and cars can generally run three stints on a set. The grip level builds throughout the event as rubber goes down and the public road gets cleaned by race traffic. The simulator work helps, but Moore said nothing matches testing and racing on the real circuit.
Source: Cadillac. Images courtesy of Cadillac.
