Nobody’s perfect. That was the tagline on one of motorsport’s greatest pieces of marketing, when Porsche displayed the driest of humour to plug its near-whitewash of the 1983 24 Hours of Le Mans. A simple black-on-white list of the top 10 results, all of them Porsches – except for a single interloper, a Sauber/BMW in ninth. We got the point.
This autumn, someone came up with a fitting pastiche of the famous ad to sum up Porsche’s 2024 season, only Endurance’s version listed 14 championship titles available across the World Endurance Championship (WEC) and the US IMSA SportsCar Series. All of them had ‘1st’ against them… except one. Porsche was second in the WEC’s Hypercar Manufacturer standings. Nobody’s perfect.
It highlights just how remarkable this season has been for sports car racing’s greatest marque, as the 963 LMDh Hypercar and 992-shape 911 GT3 R swept up most of the accolades in the world’s two major endurance series. Most, but not all. Where the pastiche ad falls short is the absence of the crown that matters most to Porsche – and everyone else for that matter – because Porsche didn’t win Le Mans this year. While losing out to Toyota by a scant two points in the WEC’s manufacturer standings will have stung, it’ll be missing out on extending its record to 20 Le Mans wins that really bites. Victory at the Big One? Now that really would have been perfect.
.jpg)
Still, there has been so much else to toast, especially after the 963’s maiden season in 2023 was somewhat underwhelming by Porsche’s high standards. The sophomore campaign, in partnership with Penske across dual fronts, got off to the perfect start in January when Felipe Nasr, Dane Cameron, Matt Campbell and Josef Newgarden sealed Porsche’s first overall win at the 24 Hours of Daytona in more than 20 years. For Roger Penske, this was his organisation’s first win at America’s greatest sports car race since before man walked on the moon. It was early in 1969 that his blue Sunoco Lola T70-Chevrolet caused an upset in the hands of Mark Donohue and Chuck Parsons. Now 87, The Captain isn’t one for great displays of emotion, but this one meant a lot.
Hot on the heels of the 963’s first ‘major’, the 4.5-litre twin-turbo V8 hybrid racer built on a Multimatic chassis kept up the winning streak with victory in the WEC’s new season opener, the oddly named Qatar 1812 Km 10-hour enduro. Kévin Estre, André Lotterer and Laurens Vanthoor pedalled their #6 entry to victory. The trio wouldn’t win again until the penultimate round at Fuji in September, but that success in Japan contributed to a 35-point cushion with only 38 left to play for at the 8 Hours of Bahrain, where they duly wrapped up the drivers’ title. It was especially sweet for 42-year-old Lotterer, previously a three-time Le Mans winner and world champion with Audi. To become champion for a second time, but now with the car maker he loves more than any other after having grown up around Porsches in his father’s race team, was something the German will cherish.
There was also a third WEC victory out of the eight rounds for Porsche, and this too was a special one. A key element of the modern Hypercar regulations is the potential for manufacturers to support privateer customer entries, a concept Porsche has fully embraced. It’s a pleasing throwback to the glory days of the 1980s in Group C, when colourful privateer 956s and 962s not only raced against but also beat the Rothmans-backed works team. History repeated in May when the British Jota team’s Hertz-backed 963 became the first privateer race winner in the Hypercar era, with British pairing Will Stevens and Callum Ilott prevailing at the Spa Six Hours.

Le Mans followed next and, after two out of three WEC victories up to this point, expectations for the 963 were naturally high. But, when it counted in changeable and difficult conditions, the red and white Penske cars never quite had the pace to put themselves in real contention to beat the Ferraris and Toyotas, which battled for victory as they had in 2023. As Ferrari claimed its second consecutive Le Mans win, the works 963s finished fourth and sixth although the margins were relatively tiny. From the bumper Hypercar entry of 23 cars, nine finished on the lead lap.
Jota provided one of the best storylines at Le Mans this year. When Ilott crashed in practice on Wednesday evening, the team faced what seemed like an almost impossible task to make the race. A new chassis was required and, once supplied by Porsche, the team set to work to complete a preparation job that usually takes three weeks. Instead, by Friday night, the #12 963 was ready for a specially sanctioned shakedown on the Le Mans airport runway that runs adjacent to the circuit – a heroic effort from the crew. In the race, both Jota cars put themselves in the mix, with Ilott, Stevens and Norman Nato leading the sister #38 entry featuring 2009 F1 world champion Jenson Button to a respectable eight-nine finish. In the circumstances, it was a victory of sorts.
By season’s end, the deflation of Le Mans was eased by the running tally of championship titles. In the USA, Daytona winners Cameron and Nasr conquered Watkins Glen, while teammates Nick Tandy and Mathieu Jaminet scored wins at Laguna Seca and Road America. At the Petit Le Mans season finale, Cameron and Dane were crowned as champions both for the Hypercar class and in the Endurance Cup for IMSA’s longest races, while in the GTD Pro category for what are essentially GT3 cars, German Lauren Heinrich became champion for Porsche team AO Racing.

The Hypercar and GT class double was mirrored in the WEC too as Porsche conquered the newly introduced LMGT3 category, seeing off eight rival manufacturers. Long-time 911 entrant Manthey PureRxcing claimed the spoils, with its drivers Klaus Bachler, Alex Malykhin and Joel Sturm wrapping up the drivers’ title a round early at Fuji. Just to rub it in for teams representing Ferrari, Aston Martin, BMW, Lamborghini, McLaren, Corvette, Ford and Lexus, Manthey EMA’s Richard Lietz, Morris Schuring and Yasser Shahin made it a Porsche one-two in the class.
Away from glory in the main sports car championships, Porsche missed out on adding to its roster of victories in the other major endurance races. The Nürburgring 24 Hours proved an unsatisfactory affair this year, with heavy fog causing the classic race to be curtailed not long after midnight. The 24 Hours was actually only seven hours and 22 minutes this time, its 50 laps setting a new record for the shortest running of the race. An attempt to restart was called off after five laps behind the safety car, during which some cars pitted – and that caused controversy because it changed the finishing order. For the record, Manthey EMA’s Laurens Vanthoor, Kévin Estre, Thomas Preining and Ayhancan Güven were classified second behind the winning Audi, but no one cared too much in such odd circumstances.
A month later, the Spa 24 Hours was also heavily affected by the weather and featured a total of 17 safety car interruptions, but did at least run for its full duration. The battle for the win was between Aston Martin and Ferrari, with the best of the Porsche entrants – a pair of 992-shaped GT3 Rs run by SSR Herberth – down in eighth and ninth.

As ever, Porsche’s single-make Cup championships kept the racing flame alive for amateurs and professionals alike, all round the world. The eight-round Supercup continued to support European Formula 1 grands prix, with Dutchman Larry ten Voorde claiming his third title and five wins, including a streak across the first four races. Rising British star Harry King was second in the points and won at the Hungaroring.
Britain’s hugely competitive Porsche Carrera Cup GB, running on the same bill as the British Touring Car Championship, was conquered this year by George Gamble, who made a successful transition from the tin-top series to win for Rosland Gold Racing by Century Motorsport. But the most sensational moment of the season was surely Abbie Eaton’s victory at Silverstone, the former W Series racer becoming the first female to win in the series’ history. She qualified on pole position and lost out to Charles Rainford in the first wet race, but then dominated a similarly slippery second encounter.
Last but absolutely not least as far as Porsche is concerned, we come to Formula E. The electric-powered single-seater championship isn’t to every racing enthusiast’s tastes – to put it mildly – but its stock remains sky high within Porsche itself. Finally, at the fifth time of asking, the factory team won a title this year. Jaguar got the cream in the manufacturers’ and teams’ stakes, but the drivers’ crown in any championship has the higher profile and, in the London finale, ex-Formula 1 racer Pascal Wehrlein undercut works Jaguar duo Nick Cassidy and Mitch Evans to claim his first world championship.

Porsche will defend all its titles in 2025 and, while they all matter, the priority is crystal clear: that landmark 20th victory at Le Mans remains the holy grail.
This feature was written by Damien Smith and first appeared in the December 2024 issue of our monthly Club magazine, Porsche Post. to receive your copy, as well as enjoying a host of exclusive member benefits and savings.