Nissan Shutters WEC LMP1 Program too

YOKOHAMA, Japan – Nissan has announced that it will withdraw its LMP1 entry from the 2016 FIA World Endurance Championship after earlier withdrawing from IMSA's Weathertech series as well.

The team originally planned to compete in the full 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship but withdrew from the first two races in order to focus on the 24 Hours of Le Mans with the front-engined GT-R LM NISMO.

The GT-R LM NISMO was far off the pace compared to the leading cars in the LMP1 class at Le Mans, qualifying 25 seconds slower. None of the cars managed to finish the race, the only event the cars has actually competed in to date.

The team later opted to totally withdraw from the rest of the World Endurance Championship schedule after Darren Cox, who led the program, left Nissan.

"Nissan entered LMP1 in the 2015 season with an innovative new, and bold concept, with the ambition to compete at the front of the field," Nissan officials said in a statement. "The teams worked diligently to bring the vehicles up to the desired performance levels. However, the company concluded that the program would not be able to reach its ambitions and decided to focus on developing its longer term racing strategies.

"Racing is a core part of the Nissan DNA, and the company has a proud history of innovating to win. Nissan’s commitment to motorsports remains strong, as evidenced by its victorious track record in the 2015 season – from achieving the overall winner of Super GT two years in a row in Japan, to winning the Blancpain Endurance Pro Class, Bathurst 12hr race with the GT-R GT3.

"Nissan will continue its support of WEC through its various engine programs including recent introduction of LMP3 engine."