Marque founder Jim Glickenhaus made the comment after the conclusion of a successful 30-hour endurance simulation for his new 007 LMH at Aragon last weekend.
The Pipo Motors-powered machine completed approaching 5000km over the course of the test on Friday and Saturday and was delayed by only one significant problem.
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“The car ran great, like a train,” Glickenhaus told Motorsport.com. “By the time we finished, we had 10,000km on the car [since it started testing], which is quite a lot. We did almost 5000km at Aragon, which included running through the night.
“We had one minor problem: an electrical connector broke as the result of vibration, but the whole wiring loom was over life, so it wasn’t surprising.”
Glickenhaus revealed that the team also practised full-course yellow running and emergency pitstops over the 30 hours.
“We did a lot of FCY tests and pulling the car into the garage and ripping stuff off the car to look for pretend problems,” he explained. “It was all good: the crew was good, the motor ran flawlessly and the lights worked properly.”
The Aragon test was undertaken by six of the seven drivers on the Glickenhaus team roster. Romain Dumas was absent because he is preparing for this weekend’s Pikes Peak hillclimb in the US, which he will contest with the Champion Porsche team.
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Richard Westbrook and Ryan Briscoe, who will partner Dumas in the solo entry at Portimao on June 13, were joined at the test by Pipo Derani, Gustavo Menezes, Olivier Pla and Franck Mailleux.
Glickenhaus also gave its second 007 chassis, which will race in Portuguese event, a shakedown over the course of the test Aragon. The car ran in the livery in which it will compete at Portimao (pictured top).
The team is scheduled to run both its cars at the Monza WEC round in July, the final race ahead of August’s rescheduled Le Mans 24 Hours.
Jim Glickenhaus questioned the balance between the cars competing in the new Hypercar class, which include Alpine’s grandfathered LMP1 car, and LMP2 machinery.
Two P2 teams joined Glickenhaus at the test at Aragon and, he claimed, were able to lap at the same pace as the 007 when it was on the second stint on a set of tyres and they were on the first.
“When the tyres fell away in the second stint, the P2s were as fast as us,” said Glickenhaus. “There is not enough separation; if they [the rulemakers] don’t deal with it, this is going to be a disaster.”
The comments from Glickenhaus mirrored those of Toyota at the opening round of the 2021 WEC at Spa earlier this month.
Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe technical director Pascal Vasselon explained that it was important for the two prototype classes to be “in different ballparks”.