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LMP3 Champion 2018

Source: lemanscup.com / Jeff Carter

By the Numbers

The opening weekend of the Michelin Le Mans Cup and European Le Mans Series at the Circuit Paul Ricard saw two young Dutch drivers take victory in their first weekend of endurance racing. Job Van Uitert stood on the top step of the ELMS LMP3 podium on Sunday afternoon but he was preceded by Leonard Hoogenboom on Saturday evening after the 18-year-old stood alongside his co-driver, Jens Petersen, on the top step of the Michelin Le Mans Cup podium.

Like his compatriot, Leonard Hoogenboom is a graduate from the Formula 4 category.  He competed in two years of the Italian series and also competed in F4 in the United Arab Emirates, where he raced four times, securing a win and a further podium finish.

Prior to 2016 Hoogenboom spent many years in karts learning his race craft and was the BNL Karting Series Rotax Max Senior Vice Champion in 2015.

Now Leonard Hoogenboom has got his endurance racing career off to a flying start with the reigning championship winning team, DKR Engineering and his German co-driver Jens Petersen.

We had a great first race.  I’ve come from Formula 4 so I had never done a rolling start before, so this is all a little bit new for me. The competition in the Le Mans Cup is very strong. I overtook some cars after I started from 5th place, which is very good.  This is a good start for the 2018 season.

For the second year in a row Luxembourg flagged team DKR Engineering secured the Michelin Le Mans Cup LMP3 title. In 2018 DKR completed the double with Léonard Hoogenboom from The Netherlands and his German co-driver Jens Petersen. Five podiums, including three wins, from seven starts garnered the team a total of 103 points, 11.5 points ahead of their nearest rivals, Alasdair McCaig and Colin Noble in the no79 Ecurie Ecosse / Nielsen Ligier-Nissan.

The season started well for DKR Engineering with Hoogenboom and Petersen securing wins in Le Castellet and Monza to head to Le Mans with a solid 50 points in the bank.  A 3rd and 4th place finish in the two 55-minute races on the full 13.6km La Sarthe circuit at Le Mans was followed a month later by a third win of the season in Austria at the Red Bull Ring.

A third place finish in Belgium followed, which secured the team the 2018 titles with one race to go in Portugal.  The race in Portimão should have been a fairy tale ending to a great year and it looked good as Jens Petersen took the lead at the start of the race from second on the grid.  However contact with another car damaged the Norma-Nissan and forced the German to retire to record the team’s only DNF of the season.

At the age of 18 Léonard Hoogenboom has secured a major tile in his debut season of endurance racing and is certainly a driver marked as a future star. This was also 55-year-old Jens Petersen’s first title, following up on his vice champions title in the 2016 V de V Challenge.