GTE / GTLM 2018, on the way to a new GT1 era

[carbsmith]

It has nothing to do with a drop in GTE Am cars. It's the field filler class in WEC and will only be there as long as there is space needing to be filled. If there was enough LMP1 and GTE Pro entries they'd drop LMP2 as well, but given it's the largest class there isn't any kind of scenario in sight for that.

Right now there is 22 cars in LMP1, LMP2, and GTE Pro and 5 cars in GTE Am. BMW is a guaranteed 2 cars added to the first group and SMP and Ginetta is a somewhat likely addition of anywhere from 3-8 cars (mind you this does assume someone takes Manor's spot in LMP2), so with the 35 car cap for the air freight it's even narrowly possible to run out of space to run a viably sized stand alone GTE Am class next season let alone a couple years in the future if more manufacturers join. ELMS would be happy to have them.

They can't just operate like GTE Am is guaranteed to be there forever then go WHOOPS when they announce the entry list in February.