Cota clash kick-starts second half of captivating campaign
Following its annual summer break, the FIA World Endurance Championship returns to action at Austin's Circuit of The Americas (COTA) in Texas this weekend, running from 4 to 6 September for the Lone Star Le Mans. Designed with the input of former motorcycling world champion Kevin Schwantz, the venue first welcomed the series in 2013 and stands as the most modern track on the calendar. Running anti-clockwise, the 5.513km, 20-turn lap features dramatic elevation changes, sweeping high-speed corners, technical sections, notorious bumps, the uphill 'Big Red' climb into Turn 1, and the triple-apex right-hander of Turns 16, 17, and 18. It is famously tough on tyres and brakes, with Hypercars exceeding 315km/h, and has earned a reputation as a car-breaker after eight crews failed to finish in 2024 and seven in 2025, despite all 35 entries completing the previous race in São Paulo two months ago.
The circuit has a history of generating breathtaking battles. The 2017 event produced the series' tightest-ever outright green flag finish at a slender 0.276 seconds, while last summer's LMGT3 margin of victory stood at an even slenderer 0.256 seconds, marking the closest finish in that class to date and in any category between two rival marques. This 2026 edition marks the championship's 15th trip to North America, its 75th six-hour race, and its 40th contest in the headlining Hypercar category. The title fight is fiercely poised with a tie at the top of the Drivers’ World Championship table and a mere five points separating multiple title-holder Toyota from breakthrough brand BMW in the Manufacturers’ standings.
Both automotive icons have triumphed twice this season, yet neither has ever won at COTA. In fact, it is one of just four tracks in the series' history that Toyota has never conquered, although #8 driver Brendon Hartley won there three consecutive years with Porsche from 2015 to 2017. Team-mate Sébastien Buemi and #7 stablemate Mike Conway are the only drivers to have participated in every one of the championship's previous races at the circuit. Meanwhile, the BMW camp holds strong prior form through Sheldon van der Linde—who partners current championship leaders and in the #20 M Hybrid V8—after he set the fastest lap of the 2025 race weekend in Austin during FP2.
Cadillac arrives on home soil hoping to maintain momentum from its first podium finish in 12 months at Interlagos with the JOTA-run V-Series.R. and are former overall winners at COTA, with the New Zealander claiming the world championship crown there in 2017, and two-time IMSA champion joins the line-up this weekend. In the wider Hypercar field, Peugeot reached the rostrum for the first time in 2025 in Texas, with team leader part of the triumphant crew in the race's inaugural running with Audi, and the Frenchman has held the official lap record at the track since 2016.
Qualifying form could prove vital this weekend, as the six-hour bout has never been won outright from lower than fourth on the grid, with six of the eight outings yielding a single-marque front row lockout. Ferrari achieved this lockout in both 2024 and 2025, and the Prancing Horse targets a similar performance to recover ground in the title fight. Boasting a 50 per cent podium strike rate in the event—better than any Hypercar rival—the defending world champions are aiming to end their longest-ever winless streak across all categories combined.
In LMGT3, Corvette leads at the mid-season stage after the #33 Z06 won at Le Mans and the sister #34 entry prevailed in Brazil, marking the first time an American carmaker has entered its home round off consecutive victories. However, the General Motors-owned brand has yet to win on US soil and holds only a solitary COTA rostrum from 2016. Local Houston-area hero Ben Keating will set a record for the most FIA WEC starts by an American driver with his 45th appearance this weekend. The USA boasts 95 total competitors in championship history—surpassed only by France and the UK—with eight on the entry list for Texas, including ex-Formula 1 star Logan Sargeant at Proton Competition.
Both previous LMGT3 contests at COTA went to British manufacturers, with McLaren claiming its maiden win last year following a post-race penalty for the #54 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari, and Heart of Racing Team winning twelve months earlier in a result that remains Aston Martin's sole class success and the only LMGT3 victory from pole. Aston Martin returns buoyed by back-to-back poles at La Sarthe and Interlagos, despite currently enduring an unprecedented barren run. Proton Competition's pair of Ford Mustangs dominated LMGT3 Hyperpole in Austin in 2025, though the category's pole position curse persists, with no subsequent pole-sitter finishing higher than the eighth place managed by the #88 Mustang last summer or scoring any points at all this year.
On-track sessions begin with free practice on Friday, 4 September. Qualifying and the Hyperpole top ten shootout commence at 15:00 local time on Saturday, 5 September, before the six-hour race gets underway at 13:00 local time on Sunday, 6 September.
