Thailand will be back to the Asian Le Mans Series

After a sad decision to not realize the 3 Hours of Buriram in 2014 due to lack of interest from the teams involved, it looks like Thailand will return to the Asian Le Mans Series calendar.

The Automobile Club de l’Ouest announced the entry of the Chang International Circuit in the AsLMS calendar as a part of a series of changes for the Asian competition, which has in mind not only the current season, but the next one too.

With the inclusion of Buriram in the calendar, the schedule will be a mid-season one, like in Formula E. The 3 Hours of Buriram will be held on January 10^th, 2016, while the 3 Hours of Sepang, which was initially confirmed to December 17^th, will be moved to the of January, two weeks after the Buriram round, on January 24^th. The other events in the 2015/2016 calendar, the 3 Hours of Fuji and the 3 Hours of Shanghai, will stay with their previously confirmed dates, still sharing the track with the FIA World Endurance Championship.

The other announcement is that the 2016/2017 season will feature five races, with at least three hours-long, starting on September of 2016 and ending on February of 2017.

About the entries allowed, the LMP2 category will continue as the main one, and the LMP3 category will join the CNs as the lower prototype category. The GT category will welcome the GTEs, GT3s and the GT300 cars from Super GT, equalized under a Balance of Performance. The GT Am category will be present too, accepting all the popular single-make GT championships present in Asia, like Lamborghini Super Trofeo, Porsche Cup, Ferrari Challenge and the Audi R8 LMS Cup.

Between the classes mentioned, three invitations to the 24 Hours of Le Mans will be awarded to the champions of the LMP2, LMP3 and GT champions, although it needs to be a full-season entry to be eligible. If no LMP3 teams race in the championship, the GT category runner-up will be awarded with a GTE-Am invitation to Le Mans.

The updated 2015/2016 AsLMS calendar is like this:

October 10^th – 3 Hours of Fuji

October 31^st – 3 Hours of Shanghai

January 10^th – 3 Hours of Buriram

January 24^th – 3 Hours of Sepang

PHOTO: Chang International Circuit, Asian Le Mans Series