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First wave of 2019 Le Mans 24 Hours entries revealed

The first 42 cars on the entry list for this year's Le Mans 24 Hours have been unveiled

The confirmed entries are those of full-time competitors in the World Endurance Championship who have gained guaranteed spots in the race, which is the final round of the 2018/19 superseason.

It had originally been announced by race organiser the Automobile Club de l'Ouest that 50 cars would be announced today.

The publication of just 42 entries means that a further 18 cars will be revealed on March 1, along with 10 reserves.

These will include the four entrants that will gain invitations for their success in the 2018/19 Asian Le Mans Series, which climaxes at Sepang on February 24.

It is expected that Corvette Racing, which will be returning to Le Mans for the 20th consecutive year, and the US arm of the Chip Ganassi Ford squad will take four of the 14 spots still up for grabs.

Porsche has already announced a four-car attack for the 2019 race.

The first wave of Le Mans entries is made up of 34 WEC regulars and eight cars that have been awarded race invites for their success in the European Le Mans Series, the IMSA SportsCar Championship and the Michelin Le Mans Cup.

Formula 1 world champion Jenson Button is listed in the #11 SMP Racing BRE-AER BR1 alongside Vitaly Petrov and Mikhail Aleshin as expected.

The Briton's return to the ART-run squad's line-up after missing the next two WEC rounds at Sebring next month and Spa in May had already been confirmed.

Ginetta, which had been a full-season WEC effort, is absent from the Le Mans entries revealed so far.

The entry includes the German ByKolles LMP1 squad, which will be absent from next month's Sebring 1000 Miles WEC round for what the team is describing as reasons for "force majeure".

ByKolles has stated that it will be back in the WEC at Spa on May 4.

The team's sporting director Manfredi Ravetto refused to comment on speculation that the team is about to have a change of engine supplier from Nissan.

"The reason we will not be at Sebring involves a third-party supplier," he said.

"It is a case of force majeure and I cannot comment on it."

The publication of the entry list confirmed that Daniel Serra and Miguel Molina will again be the third drivers in Ferrari's two regular WEC entries run by AF Corse.

Ferrari and Porsche are the only manufacturers to confirm all three drivers for their factory GTE Pro entries.

BMW has only listed one driver in each of its two MTEK-run M8 GTEs.

In GTE Am, Ford will also have its first GT customer team with Keating Motorsports confirmed as running one car.

The rules of the race require teams to nominate only one driver at this stage.

First-time entrants at Le Mans this year include the British RLR Msport.

It will field an LMP2 ORECA-Gibson 07 after gaining an automatic entry for winning the LMP3 title in last year's ELMS.

The ACO has revealed that it received 75 applications for entries for the 87th running of the 24 Hours.

Initial 2019 Le Mans 24 Hours entries

No. Class Team Car Drivers
1 LMP1 Rebellion Racing Rebellion R13-Gibson Neel Jani, Andre Lotterer, Bruno Senna
3 LMP1 Rebellion Racing Rebellion R13-Gibson Thomas Laurent, Nathanael Berthon, Gustavo Menezes
4 LMP1 ByKolles Racing Team ENSO CLM P1/01-Nissan Tom Dillmann
7 LMP1 Toyota Gazoo Racing Toyota TS050 HYBRID Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez
8 LMP1 Toyota Gazoo Racing Toyota TS050 HYBRID Sebastien Buemi, Kazuki Nakajima, Fernando Alonso
10 LMP1 DragonSpeed BR Engineering BR1-Gibson Henrik Hedman, Ben Hanley, Renger van der Zande
11 LMP1 SMP Racing BR Engineering BR1-AER Vitaly Petrov, Mikhail Aleshin, Jenson Button
17 LMP1 SMP Racing BR Engineering BR1-AER Stephane Sarrazin, Egor Orudzhev, Sergey Sirotkin
26 LMP2 G-Drive Racing ORECA 07-Gibson Romain Rusinov
28 LMP2 TDS Racing ORECA 07-Gibson Francois Perrodo, Matthieu Vaxiviere, Loic Duval
29 LMP2 Racing Team Nederland Dallara P217 07-Gibson Frits van Eerd, Giedo van der Garde, Nyck de Vries
31 LMP2 DragonSpeed ORECA 07-Gibson Roberto Gonzalez, Pastor Maldonado, Anthony Davidson
26 LMP2 Signatech Alpine Alpine A470-Gibson Nico Lapierre, Andre Negrao, Pierre Thiriet
37 LMP2 Jackie Chan DC Racing ORECA 07-Gibson David Heinemeier Hansson
38 LMP2 Jackie Chan DC Racing ORECA 07-Gibson Ho-Pin Tung, Stephane Richelmi, Gabriel Aubry
43 LMP2 RLR M Sport ORECA 07-Gibson John Farano
50 LM2 Larbre Competition Ligier JSP217-Gibson Erwin Creed, Romano Ricci
51 GTE Pro AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado, Daniel Serra
66 GTE Pro Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK Ford GT Stefan Mucke, Olivier Pla
67 GTE Pro Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK Ford GT Andy Priaulx, Harry Tincknell
71 GTE Pro AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo Davide Rigon, Sam Bird, Miguel Molina
81 GTE Pro BMW Team MTEK BMW M8 GTE Nicky Catsburg
82 GTE Pro BMW Team MTEK BMW M8 GTE Augusto Frafus
91 GTE Pro Porsche GT Team Porsche 911 RSR Richard Lietz, Gianmaria Bruni, Fred Makowiecki
92 GTE Pro Porsch GT Team Porsche 911 RSR Michael Christensen, Kevin Estre, Laurens Vanthoor
95 GTE Pro Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin Vantage AMR Nicki Thiim, Marco Sorensen
97 GTE Pro Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin Vantage AMR Maximie Martin, Alex Lynn
54 GTE Am Spirit of Race Ferrari 488 GTE Thomas Flohr, Francesco Castellacci, Giancarlo Fisichella
56 GTE Am Team Project 1 Porsche 911 RSR Jorg Bergmeister, Patrick Lindsey, Egidio Perfetti
61 GTE Am Clearwater Racing Ferarri 488 GTE Luis Perez Companc, Matt Griffin, Matteo Cressoni
62 GTE Am Weathertech Racing Ferrari 488 GTE Cooper Macneil
70 GTE Am MR Racing Ferrari 488 GTE Motoaki Ishikawa, Olivier Beretta, Eddie Cheever
77 GTE Am Dempset-Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR Matt Campbell
88 GTE Am Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR Satoshi Hoshino, Gianluca Roda, Matteo Cairoli
99 GTE Am Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR Patrick Long
78 GTE Am Proton Competition Porsche 911 RSR Chen
84 GTE Am JMW Motorsport Ferrari 488 GTE Jonny Cocker
85 GTE Am Keating Motorsports Ford GT Ben Keating, Jeroen Bleekemolen, Felipe Fraga
86 GTE Am Gulf Racing Porsche 911 RSR Michael Wainwright, Ben Barker
90 GTE Am TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage Salih Yoluc, Eaun Alers-Hankey, Charlie Eastwood
98 GTE Am Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin Vantage Paul Dalla Lana, Pedro Lamy, Mathias Lauda
60 GTE Am Kessel Racing Ferrari 488 GTE Claudio Schiavoni

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