MOTORSPORT: Webber's latest Le Mans quest

Porsche's upgraded 919 Hybrid has proven mighty quick in testing but now comes the true test as the World Endurance Championship begins

The Formula One world title eluded Mark Webber and, to date, so too has success at the Le Mans 24-Hour – the world's greatest sports car race.

Webber's 12-year F1 career seems a distant memory, although it should not be forgotten that it included nine Grand Prix wins, but his racing life now is very much about sports cars.

This weekend the 38-year-old originally from Queanbeyan, near Canberra, starts a new quest for glory in the World Endurance Championship, and especially at Le Mans, in an upgraded Porsche 919 Hybrid.

It is the second year Porsche has been back in the top level of sports car racing and this time its car is down to the 870kg minimum weight, the manufacturer having shaved 30kg from last year, and its hybrid drivetrain has been improved.

Porsche has stepped up to the highest of the WEC's four classes of energy recovery, 8 megajoules (MJ), boasting that no other race car among the rival prototypes in the WEC or the open-wheelers in F1 turns over as much energy as the 919.

A 2-litre V4 turbocharged petrol engine powers the rear axle with more than 500 horsepower and when the driver recalls stored energy from a lithium-ion battery an extra 400hp or more drives the front axle, temporarily turning the 919 into a four-wheel-drive with close to 1000hp.

It has two energy recovery systems – one converts kinetic braking energy from the front axle into electricity, the other does the same by a turbine in the exhaust, which makes Porsche's prototype unique in the WEC in producing electricity when accelerating.

The WEC begins with a six-hour race on Sunday at Britain's Silverstone, with another of the same duration at Belgium's Spa-Francorchamps on the first weekend of May, before the crown jewel of the series – the 24-Hour at Le Mans in France in mid-June.

Webber went to Le Mans twice in the late 1990s with Mercedes-Benz, the second of those visits ending before the race began after a couple of death-defying flips in a car that subsequently was outlawed because of its unsafe aerodynamics.

In his, and Porsche's, comeback to sports car racing last year he found himself leading Le Mans within two hours of the finish, only for a powertrain problem to force him out.

The sister 919 ran into trouble soon after.

"There is never ever a good retirement in Le Mans, but that was one of the best you could probably have in a way because we went so far and we learned so much," Webber said.

"We never expected to be in such a great position towards the end of the race. It was a very big feather in Porsche's cap."

That campaign had begun at Silverstone too, with Webber and his co-drivers – German Timo Bernhard and New Zealander Brendon Hartley – third there behind two of Toyota's TS040s that ultimately won the WEC, even though Audi maintained its stranglehold on the Le Mans trophy.

The eight-round championship ended with Webber concussed after a collision at Brazil's Interlagos circuit with a Ferrari 458 Italia and then a barrier as the other 919 gave Porsche its first victory in its new chapter of prototype racing.

The upgraded 919 for this year has done more than 30,000km of testing – and more than 4000 of those during the official WEC pre-season "Prologue" at France's Paul Ricard track, where it topped the timesheets in all five sessions.

It was 1.838 seconds quicker than the next-best make, Toyota, which won five of the eight rounds last year and will run in the 6MJ class this year with its 3.7-litre naturally-aspirated V8s.

Porsche is said to have targeted a 2 per cent reduction in lap times at all venues this season, which would mean a 4-second improvement on a lap of the long La Sarthe circuit at Le Mans – where it will field three cars.

However, suspicions linger that Audi's updated R18 e-tron quattros with turbocharged 550-horsepower, 4.0-litre diesel V6s that have moved up from 2MJ to 4MJ will still have, crucially, the best stint performance.

Beyond Le Mans there will be another five races again, each of six hours – at the (modern) Nurburgring in Germany, the Circuit of the Americas in Texas, Fuji in Japan, Shanghai in China (where F1 is racing this weekend) and Bahrain.

The Porsche executive in charge of the company's prototype sports car program, Fritz Enzinger, says "we have got a very fast car, for sure, expectations have increased, but we are impressed by the performance of the competition on longer runs".

Stalwart sports car driving ace Bernhard says the latest 919 "is more agile and reacts better for the driver".

"Some of the small things have really helped, like driver ergonomics in the cockpit," Bernhard says.

"All these things and the knowledge from last year have combined to make a better package. We are in a stronger position than 12 months ago.

"We know it will be tough this season, but we are much more prepared in terms of experience. We know all the circuits, we know the strategies and different variables we have to face on track, and we obviously also know the competition more now."

Webber says Porsche "still have to find some performance on long runs" but he's keen to get the season underway at Silverstone, close to his British base and where he's had plenty of success over two decades.

"Silverstone is demanding, with a huge amount of change of direction and fast corner combinations," Webber says.

"Silverstone stands for pure racing. It is such a classic track. It's raw. It's old-school.

"I won my first race there in 1996 in a Formula Ford, in sports cars with Mercedes in 1998, and in 2000 in Formula 3000.

"Winning there in F1 [in 2010 and 2012] was the next best thing to winning my home GP in Melbourne, which I never managed to do."

Fellow Australian veteran David Brabham has had a late call-up for Silverstone to replace American Johannes van Overbeek, who has a rib injury, in a Honda Performance Development ARX-03b in the second prototype division.

WEC organisers are endeavouring to create a Le Mans spirit at every round. The cars will be lined up at an angle at the side of the track as they were for the start of the French classic in the days when drivers ran across from the other side to get in them. Then will come the formation lap and the now-standard rolling start.

The big break with tradition this year though is the scrapping of grid girls – an attempt to ensure the focus is on the cars and drivers.

At Silverstone the contest will be for the Royal Automobile Club Tourist Trophy, reckoned to be the oldest still being contested in motorsport.

Superstar driver Sir Stirling Moss held this trophy aloft seven times – twice each after victories in Aston Martins, Ferraris, Jaguars and once in a Mercedes-Benz.

Ferrari won it six times in all and Aston Martin five times.

Audi has had two victories, Nissan two too (but won't debut its radical GT-R LM Nismo until Le Mans, after failing a crash test) and Toyota one.

Porsche is the only manufacturer competing in the WEC not to have won the trophy.

Perhaps this time.

World Endurance Championship calendar