Oreca 07

The Oreca 07 is a Le Mans Prototype built by French manufacturer Oreca to meet the 2017 FIA and ACO LMP2 regulations. It made its official race debut in the opening round of the 2017 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, the 24 Hours of Daytona, and its FIA World Endurance Championship debut at the 2017 6 Hours of Silverstone. The car is the successor to the Oreca 05.

Oreca 07 turned out to be the car of choice for LMP2 teams, finding more buyers every year, who switched to the chassis from the previously purchased ones of other brands. All 24 LMP2 cars in the 2023 24 Hours of Le Mans were the Oreca 07. Since the 2019 IMSA season, only three LMP2 entries have not been an Oreca 07.

Development

The preparation of the prototype traces back to the development of the Oreca 05. The Oreca 05 was developed with the consideration of what the factory knew about the new technical rules for the LMP2 class in the FIA World Endurance Championship for 2017. Taking knowledge from the Oreca 05's performance, the French team decided to develop a new car, and based it around the predecessor. Oreca's goal was to maximize the performance by focusing on the energy and resource usage. The team opted to use this strategy not only to build a car based on a proven predecessor, but also to allow teams update their Oreca 05's within reason to costs. The chassis of the Oreca 07 is mainly based on the 05, with the monocoque being not focused on much with the car. The Oreca 07 internals come equipped with a Gibson GK-428 V8 engine.

The car performed its first factory shakedown test in late October 2016 at Circuit Paul Ricard.

Current orders see confirmed production until the end of April 2022, at which point well over 90 chassis will have been produced, including 8 chassis for the Acura ARX-05 DPi programme and 9 updates for the Oreca 05, but not including the Rebellion R-One (based on the 05) or Rebellion R13 (based on the 07) – (or indeed the grandfathered Alpine A480). The total does include the renamed but identical Alpine LMP2s and Aurus 01s. The following month, chassis #100 (though technically the 99th due to skipping #13) was delivered to Cool Racing for the 2022 24 Hours of Le Mans, and will eventually be displayed at the company's factory showroom.

Variations

Alpine A470

French car manufacturer Alpine raced the Alpine A470 in the FIA World Endurance Championship with Team Signatech Alpine Matmut. This car is technically identical to the Oreca 07, using the same chassis and internals, with Alpine branding. This is the successor to the Alpine A460, which Alpine raced and won the LMP2 category for the 2016 FIA World Endurance Championship season.

Acura ARX-05

A variation of the prototype, the Acura ARX-05, was created for IMSA's WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Prototype class under the DPi regulations. The car was developed through a partnership between Honda Performance Development and Oreca. The powerplant of the vehicle is a production-based 3.5 litre V6 twin-turbo Acura AR35TT. Other alterations from the 07 include Acura-specific bodywork.

From 2018 to 2020, Team Penske entered a pair of ARX-05s, winning the title in the latter two seasons. For 2021 and 2022, Wayne Taylor Racing and Meyer Shank Racing each campaigned one of the ARX-05s previously run by Penske.

Aurus 01

G-Drive Racing competed with Oreca 07 in 2017 and 2018. Russian car manufacturer Aurus Motors partnered with them in 2019 to rebrand it as Aurus 01 and to race it in the European Le Mans Series. This car is technically identical to the Oreca 07, using the same chassis and internals, with Aurus branding.

Rebellion R13

The Rebellion R13 is a sports prototype racing car built by French constructor Oreca on behalf of Swiss-based team Rebellion Racing. It is a variation of the Oreca 07, created to compete in the LMP1 class. It would later be renamed by Alpine to Alpine A480 when it was rebadged to run in grandfathered condition in the Hypercar class in 2021 and 2022.

Complete IMSA SportsCar Championship results

Results in bold indicate pole position. Results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.

^* Points were scored with the Ligier JS P217
^† Points only counted towards the Michelin Endurance Cup, and not the overall LMP2 Championship.

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

Results in bold indicate pole position. Results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.

Complete European Le Mans Series results

Results in bold indicate pole position. Results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.

Complete Asian Le Mans Series results

Results in bold indicate pole position. Results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.

Gallery

File:Alpine A470-Gibson - Team Signatech Alpine Matmut.jpg, The Alpine A470 is a variation of 07, pictured here is the No. 36 car of Signatech Alpine Matmut at the 2017 24 Hours of Le Mans
File:Acura Penske Number 6 (cropped).jpg, The Acura ARX-05 is a variation of the 07, pictured here is the No. 6 car of Team Penske at the 2018 Sports Car Challenge of Mid-Ohio
File:Aurus 01 - Gibson - G-Drive Racing - 2019 4 Hours of Silverstone.jpg, The No. 26 Aurus 01 car at the 2019 4 Hours of Silverstone
File:Oreca 07 - Miroslav Konopka, Bent Viscaal & Tristan Vautier in Dunlop Chicane at the 2022 Le Mans (53500669049).jpg, The No. 44 car entered by Autoracing Club Bratislava at the 2022 24 Hours of Le Mans
File:Oreca 07 - Steven Thomas, James Allen & Rene Binder in the Esses at the 2022 Le Mans (53515038559).jpg, The No. 45 car entered by Algarve Pro Racing took the victory of the LMP2 Pro-Am class of the 2022 24 Hours of Le Mans
File:IMSA Sebring 12H 2024 -i---i- (53910492999).jpg, The No. 04 car entered by CrowdStrike Racing at the 2024 12 Hours of Sebring
File:2024 4 Hours of Le Castellet 34.jpg, The No. 83 AF Corse car driven by Matthieu Vaxivière at the 2024 4 Hours of Le Castellet

References

{{IMSA cars 2025
24 Hours of Le Mans race cars
Le Mans Prototypes
Sports prototypes