Hyundai Motors To Enter World Famous Le Mans Races Soon!

SAUDI ARABIA : Hyundai, a brand known for its family-oriented, comfortable cars, is ready to enter Le Mans races soon. For the uninitiated, Le Mans is one of the world's hardest races and will be quite a task for Hyundai. 

• The brand will be entering the races with its Genesis car
• 2026 is when we might see the brand make an entrance there
• The Hypercar class is where Hyundai will participate in

Hyundai Motorsport is preparing itself to enter endurance racing and all indications are that the company will make a grand entry at the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans. But rather than do so under its traditional Hyundai brand, the automaker has resolved to use its ‘Genesis’ subsidiary to sell its cars globally. 

Focusing on endurance racing, Genesis plans to merge the technology of creating top-quality vehicles with the sleekness of luxurious design to become a worthy rival for such giants as Audi or BMW. Hyundai’s Motorsport division will build a prototype car tailored to the existing LMDh rules of the so-called ‘Hypercar’ class that is part of WEC. 

If it enters this class Genesis will be competing with such titans of the automotive industry as BMW, Alpine, Porsche, Lamborghini, and Cadillac, all of which struggle to outdo one another. Genesis has already hinted at what’s possible with its hypercar concepts, although under the ‘LMDh ruleset, it isn’t mandatory to produce road-legal renditions of these race cars – thus providing a creative outlet for such designs.

Specially Designed Cars

The LMDh cars that Hyundai intends to field are purpose-built for the IMSA SportsCar Championship, a prominent racing series based in the United States. However, they won't be confined to American tracks. These vehicles, alongside the LMH prototypes from the likes of Ferrari, Toyota, and other major manufacturers, are also eligible to compete in prestigious European endurance events. 

While Genesis hasn’t officially committed to entering the 24 Hours of Le Mans just yet, doing so would undoubtedly boost the brand's global recognition, firmly establishing it among the elite circle of luxury performance manufacturers.

Timeline

To date, Hyundai has not yet officially determined the moment of its becoming a part of the endurance racing weekends and provides different rewards for fans and other industry representatives. Other organisations such as Autosport have given indications that Genesis might make its first appearance on the racetrack by as early as 2026. 

On different platforms of social media, Genesis has suggested that the LMDh program is a new frontier for Hyundai Motorsport which mainly focuses on the TCR series and WRC.