American Dane Cameron Headlines Porsche Penske's 963 Driver Lineups

At today's Night of Champions event, Porsche has announced driver assignments for its four factory entries split across the FIA World Endurance Championship and IMSA GTP championships. As the manufacturer announced in 2021, both programs will be run by Team Penske as a bi-continental, three-facility alliance called Porsche Penske Motorsport.

The first Porsche Penske Motorsport entry running full-time in the World Endurance Championship will be run by IMSA prototype champion Dane Cameron alongside former Porsche GT drivers Michael Christensen and Frédéric Makowiecki. The second will be driven by GT aces Kévin Estre and Laurens Vanthoor alongside André Lotterer, a current Formula E and one-time Formula 1 driver most notable for his three overall wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with Audi in the early 2010s. While the team could be granted additional entries for the 24 hour classic, these six drivers are the only Porsche factory pilots certain to be racing at Le Mans in the 963 this season.

Although everyone but Lotterer is a relatively unconventional choice, Dane Cameron stands out as the most unique of the group. Cameron, alongside fellow IMSA prototype driver Felipe Nasr, was among the first two drivers signed to the program a year ago. It seemed likely at the time he would continue in IMSA, where he has already won two prototype championships. Instead, Cameron has been assigned to the Europe-focused WEC and will be guaranteed a shot at winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans. As an American driver, this is an exceptionally rare opportunity. No major factory has enlisted an American at the top class in the race in decades, and, although 12 Americans have won the race in its history, none has done so since 1996.

Cameron, who ran some WEC races with Penske's LMP2 program in preparation for the 963 operation last year, spoke with Road & Track about the potential of a Le Mans assignment at a Daytona test earlier this month. He noted that the opportunity to fight for that win presents a great chance to show other young American drivers that there are great achievements available to them in sports cars: