Four-time 24 Hours of Le Mans class winner Nicolas Lapierre has left the cockpit with immediate effect to think about managing the Cool Racing team.
The statement made by the 40-year-old Frenchman on Wednesday signifies that last month's Fuji round of the World Endurance Championships, during which he finished third with Alpine, was his last race.
“It's time to hang up my helmet and end this chapter of my life,” Lapierre said in a brief video post on Instagram. “It was great to finish this journey on the rostrum and spray the champagne once more. It's an honor for me to live for my passion and do what I like for thus a few years.
Lapierre said it was time for “a new chapter in my life on the other side of the pitwall.” He added: “I love it as much as racing, so I won't be far away.”
Nicolas Lapierre, Alpine A424
Photo: Alpine
Lapierre will give attention to CLX Motorsport, which he founded with Alexandre Coigny in 2020. The team operates under the Cool Racing banner and is predicated in Annecy, France, just across the border from Geneva. He competed within the LMP2 and LMP3 classes of the European Le Mans Series, in addition to the 24 Hours of Le Mans in P2.
Lapierre took the chance in his video statement to thank a lot of riders from a profession during which he was a race winner within the GP2 and A1 Grand Prix and within the WEC with each Toyota and Alpine.
Among them was Philippe Sinault, who played a task in a few of his best successes, each in single-seaters and sports cars.
Sinault leads the Signatech team, which has led Alpine's endurance campaigns since 2013, and its predecessor, Signature, for whom Lapierre won the 2003 Formula 3 Macau Grand Prix.
He also honored Jean-Paul Driot, the late founder and head of the DAMS team.
“I also consider Jean-Paul Driot; he left too soon,” Lapierre said. “Thanks to him and his team, I used to be in a position to take my first GP2 victory in 2007 – he definitely modified my profession.”
Nicolas Lapierre, DAMS, crosses the finish line and takes victory
Also mentioned was ORECA boss Hugues de Chaunac, who gave Lapierre his first likelihood at sports automotive racing in 2007 and with whom he won the 2011 12 Hours of Sebring aboard a Peugeot 908 HDi LMP1 semi.
Lapierre's contract with ORECA made it easier for him to affix Toyota's LMP1 lineup after the WEC's revival in 2012, because the French organization was a part of the Japanese manufacturer's race set-up until the tip of 2020.
He won six WEC races with Toyota before being controversially sacked midway through the 2014 season following crashes at each Le Mans and the Austin round, despite running on slick tires in heavy rain on each occasions.
Lapierre paid tribute to former ORECA technical director David Floury, who now holds the identical role at Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe, for his encouragement on the time.
“He was a very important person in my career and life,” he said. “I was probably at the worst moment of my racing career: I was very close to quitting racing and he was the one who brought me back.”
Lapierre's announcement comes as Cool is thought to be considered one of the candidates for a partnership with Hyundai Motorsport preparing to enter the prototype ranks with a brand new LMDh under the South Korean manufacturer's premium Genesis brand.
Lapierre's place within the No. 36 Alpine A424 LMDh alongside Mick Schumacher and Matthieu Vaxiviere on the 2024 WEC Final in Bahrain is predicted to be taken by Jules Gounon.
Gounon is Alpine's official reserve driver and was brought into the Fuji squad as a part of a plan agreed before the beginning of the season to extend his experience within the Hypercar division.
He replaced Paul-Loup Chatin and, under the identical agreement, he was appointed as Bahrain's substitute for Charles Milesi, who had been Alpine's standout rider during its rise to the front of the Hypercar field since Le Mans.
