The Rebellion R13 is a
sports prototype
A sports prototype, sometimes referred to simply as a prototype, is a type of Auto racing, race car that is used in high-level categories of sports car racing. They are purpose-built auto-sports race cars, as opposed to production-car based or s ...
racing car built by
French
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Arts and media
* The French (band), ...
constructor
Oreca
ORECA (Organisation Exploitation Compétition Automobiles) is a French auto racing, racing team and race car constructor, founded in 1973 and run by Hugues de Chaunac, former team manager of F1 team Automobiles Gonfaronnaises Sportives, AGS. Or ...
on behalf of
Swiss
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* the adjectival form of Switzerland
* Swiss people
Swiss may also refer to: Places
* Swiss, Missouri
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* Swiss, Wisconsin
Other uses
* Swiss Café, an old café located ...
-based team
Rebellion Racing
Rebellion Racing was a Swiss racing team that competed in endurance racing. The team competed in the 2011 Intercontinental Le Mans Cup season and won the LMP1 teams' title in the 2011 Le Mans Series season. The team started as an association ...
. It is a variation of the
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 Dayt ...
, created to compete in the LMP1 class. It would later be renamed by
Alpine
Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to:
Places Europe
* Alps, a European mountain range
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Australia
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to Alpine A480 when it was rebadged to run as a grandfathered into the
Hypercar class in 2021 and 2022.
Competition history
2018–19
The R13 debuted in the
FIA World Endurance Championship
The FIA World Endurance Championship, abbreviated as WEC, is a world championship for automobile endurance racing organized by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) and sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The se ...
during its
Super Season. Over the course of the season it achieved victory and fastest lap at the
2018 6 Hours of Silverstone
The 2018 6 Hours of Silverstone was an Endurance racing (motorsport), endurance sports car racing event held at the Silverstone Circuit in Northamptonshire, England on 17–19 August 2018. Silverstone served as the third round of the 2018-19 FIA ...
, with further podiums at both Spa races, Fuji and the
2018 24 Hours of Le Mans
The 86th 24 Hours of Le Mans () was an 24-hour automobile endurance race for Le Mans Prototype and Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance cars entered by teams of three drivers each held from 16 to 17 June 2018 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, close ...
, for a total of 6 for the season. Rebellion finished in 2nd place in the World Endurance LMP1 Championship with 134 points, making the R13 the best of the non-hybrid cars.
2019–20
For the
2019-20 season, Rebellion reduced their full-season effort to a single car; the #1 driven by Menezes, Nato and Senna, with a second car appearing in select European races. This would later translate to a second R13, the #3, appearing in the
2019 4 Hours of Silverstone, where it finished 3rd and the
2019 24 Hours of Le Mans
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, where it finished 4th, though those results would not count towards the championship as only the #1 was eligible for points.
For that season, the WEC introduced a system of success ballast, which slowed down cars' performance according to their results in the championship, with the aim of equaling the performance of non-hybrid cars, the R13 and the
Ginetta G60-LT-P1
The Ginetta G60-LT-P1 is a non-hybrid Le Mans Prototype built by Ginetta Cars, Ginetta for use in the LMP1 category for the FIA World Endurance Championship, as well as the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The G60-LT-P1 had its competition debut at the 2018 ...
, with that of the
Toyota TS050 Hybrid
The Toyota TS050 Hybrid is a sports prototype racing car developed for the 2016 Le Mans Prototype rules in the FIA World Endurance Championship. The car is the direct successor of the Toyota TS040 Hybrid, which competed in both the 2014 FIA Worl ...
. This system allowed the R13 to be more competitive to the TS050, and the #1 Rebellion would take 2 victories during the season at
Shanghai
Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...
and at
Austin
Austin refers to:
Common meanings
* Austin, Texas, United States, a city
* Austin (given name), a list of people and fictional characters
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. At Shanghai, Rebellion would also become the first privateer team to get an overall pole position in WEC history, with that being also the first of the 4 consecutive pole positions the R13 would take during the season, with the rest coming in
Bahrain
Bahrain, officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, is an island country in West Asia. Situated on the Persian Gulf, it comprises a small archipelago of 50 natural islands and an additional 33 artificial islands, centered on Bahrain Island, which mak ...
, Austin, and
Spa
A spa is a location where mineral-rich spring water (sometimes seawater) is used to give medicinal baths. Spa health treatments are known as balneotherapy. The belief in the curative powers of mineral waters and hot springs goes back to pre ...
. The car would also set 3 fastest laps during the season, at Austin, Spa and Le Mans. Rebellion would skip the season finale at Bahrain after Toyota clinched the LMP1 teams' title at Le Mans, finishing second with 145 points and having scored podiums at all 7 rounds of the season it had been a part of.
Alpine A480
On September 10, 2020, French-language magazine ''Auto Hebdo'' reported that the
Signatech Alpine team competing in LMP2 during the
2019–20 WEC season would step up to the new
Le Mans Hypercar
A Le Mans Hypercar (LMH) is a type of sports prototype race car that competes alongside LMDh entries in the Hypercar class of the FIA World Endurance Championship. It also competes in the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) class of the IMSA SportsC ...
class for 2021 with a re-badged R13, with agreement that LMH rules in the initial season would include an allowance to re-homologate ("grandfather") non-hybrid LMP1 cars. The report was confirmed by
Alpine
Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to:
Places Europe
* Alps, a European mountain range
** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range
Australia
* Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village
* Alpine National P ...
on September 12. On January 21, 2021, the entry list for the
2021 FIA World Endurance Championship
The 2021 FIA World Endurance Championship was the ninth season of the FIA World Endurance Championship, an auto racing series organised by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) and the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO). The series ...
season was released, where the entry was confirmed and the car rename to Alpine A480 made official, with
André Negrão
André Negrão (born ) is a Brazilian racing driver. He most recently drove for Alpine in the Hypercar class of the FIA World Endurance Championship in 2023, and spent a total of seven seasons with the team during his tenure. Negrão is a for ...
being one of the drivers. The rest of the line-up was announced on January 26, with
Nicolas Lapierre
Nicolas Camile Bernard Lapierre (born 2 April 1984) is a retired French professional racing driver and team principal. Notable for winning the LMP2 class four times at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Lapierre was a factory driver at Toyota during the ea ...
and
Matthieu Vaxivière
Matthieu Vaxivière (born 3 December 1994) is a French racing driver from Limoges. He has been a factory driver for the Alpine Elf Team, Alpine brand since 2021, as part of which he has competed in the Le Mans Hypercar, Hypercar class of the 2024 ...
joining Negrão.
The initial LMH rules targeted a significantly lower performance than 2020 LMP1, adding around ten seconds to a lap of
Circuit de la Sarthe
The Circuit des 24 Heures du Mans, also known as Circuit de la Sarthe (after the 1906 French Grand Prix triangle circuit) located in Le Mans, Sarthe, France, is a semi-permanent motorsport race course, chiefly known as the venue for the 24 H ...
, which made significant changes necessary to grandfathered cars to achieve homologation. These included:
* agreement to use a single aero kit - the Le Mans focused "low-downforce kit" - at all circuits through the season, a change from the WEC LMP1 rules and practice of mixing high-downforce and low-downforce kits as appropriate to the circuits.
* Participation in the new Hypercar class
Balance of Performance
In sports car racing, balance of performance (BoP) is a regulation and mechanism that maintains parity between competing vehicles by adjusting the limits and parameters of a vehicle such as horsepower, weight, engine management, and aerodynamics ...
(BoP) system to ensure parity between entrants in the class. The BoP envelope was set against the significantly lower target lap times and therefore had a high impact on the Alpine car originally built to meet the higher LMP1 specs and not designed for a BoP ruleset.
Furthermore, whilst changes to the fuel tank were not necessary to meet homologation, the fuel capacity within the chassis was originally designed around the LMP2 ruleset (75 litres). However, the Hypercar rules were designed around 12-lap stints for the Le Mans race. Once the changes for LMP1 and then grandfathering had been made, the fuel consumption of the car would not allow these 12 laps fuel stints from a 75-litre tank; and in the Rebellion era for this car it achieved only 11 laps even with LMP1's lower weight.
For LMH, the BoP fuelling limit for the A480 was set to allow 12 laps but it was not possible to physically fit this allowance into the smaller tank, and Oreca were not able to find a workaround compatible with homologation in time for the inaugural race at Spa, where the disadvantage was enough to add an extra fuel stop compared to Toyota.
2021
Ahead of the formal pre-season testing sessions for registered 2021 entrants (known as the "Prologue" in WEC), the initial Balance of Performance for the A480's weight was increased to 930 kg (from LMP1's 824 kg) and its peak power output reduced to 610 hp (450 kW). The large weight penalty was necessary for parity with the heavier but more powerful
Toyota GR010 Hybrid
The Toyota GR010 Hybrid is a sports prototype Auto racing, racing car developed by Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe for the 2021 Le Mans Hypercar rules in the FIA World Endurance Championship. The car is the successor of the Toyota TS050 Hybrid, which ...
.
During the
2021 season
1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...
Alpine managed to score podiums in all six races, while also taking pole position and fastest lap at the
8 Hours of Portimão
8 (eight) is the natural number following 7 and preceding 9.
Etymology
English ''eight'', from Old English '', æhta'', Proto-Germanic ''*ahto'' is a direct continuation of Proto-Indo-European '' *oḱtṓ(w)-'', and as such cognate wi ...
, scoring 128 points and finishing second in the Hypercar World Endurance Championship, never overcoming the stint-length deficit caused by their smaller fuel tank. Lapierre, Negrão and Vaxivière finished 3rd as a crew in the Hypercar World Endurance Drivers' Championship with the same points tally.
2022
On 16 February 2022 Alpine announced that the car would complete for a further and final season with the same driver line-up of Lapierre, Negrão and Vaxivière.
Complete World Endurance Championship results
Results in bold indicate pole position. Results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.
Only the highest-finishing car for each manufacturer scored points.
Only the results of the full-season entry #1 counted towards the standings.
See also
*
Toyota TS050 Hybrid
The Toyota TS050 Hybrid is a sports prototype racing car developed for the 2016 Le Mans Prototype rules in the FIA World Endurance Championship. The car is the direct successor of the Toyota TS040 Hybrid, which competed in both the 2014 FIA Worl ...
*
Ginetta G60-LT-P1
The Ginetta G60-LT-P1 is a non-hybrid Le Mans Prototype built by Ginetta Cars, Ginetta for use in the LMP1 category for the FIA World Endurance Championship, as well as the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The G60-LT-P1 had its competition debut at the 2018 ...
*
BR Engineering BR1
The BR Engineering BR1 is a sports prototype non-hybrid racing car built for the SMP Racing and DragonSpeed teams. It is designed to meet the 2018 LMP1 regulations for Le Mans Prototypes in the FIA World Endurance Championship as well as at the ...
*
CLM P1/01
The CLM P1/01, renamed ENSO CLM P1/01 in 2017, is a sports prototype racing car built for Lotus Racing in 2014. The Lotus team entered the last five rounds of the World Endurance championship in 2014, but later took name as the Austrian based team ...
References
{{WEC cars 2022
Le Mans Prototypes
24 Hours of Le Mans race cars
Sports prototypes