Buying A Glickenhaus Le Mans Hypercar Seems A Little Too Easy

From Road & Track

The 2021 24 Hours of Le Mans has been delayed to August, a move intended to allow the race to host spectators when it finally is run. It has an added secondary benefit, however; both new-for-2021 Hypercars will have an additional two months of prep time before their biggest-ever race. This is a nice plus for Toyota, a program that has put major work into developing its GR010 over the course of years, but it seems to be an even bigger boost to Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus, the independent American program producing the SCG 007. Their program is considered a heavy underdog to both Toyota and a grandfathered LMP1 car being run by Alpine Racing, and a late announcement of delay that will keep their cars from appearing at Portimao has caused further worry over the stability of the program. Team owner Jim Glickenhaus remains as confident as he ever has, however, and he sees this delay as an opportunity to not just improve but expand.

Yes, for just $6 million US dollars, Glickenhaus says you can buy a third SCG 007, a purchase that he says would lead the team to expand to three cars before this year's 24 hour race.

There are some obvious questions about the feasibility of this to be raised. The first SCG 007 was completed just a few weeks ago and hit the track in anger for the first time earlier this month. The program has also only officially entered two cars for the FIA World Endurance Championship season, and, while Le Mans entries are not actually announced until a later date, the selection process is not traditionally easy, and his third car could simply be left off the entry whether he has sold it or not. But, if the SCG 007 is fast and reliable, and the race organizers grant him a third entry, $6 million is something of a bargain for a real shot to win overall.

If the car makes the race, a chance to compete for an overall win at Le Mans on just five months of notice is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Even if it does not actually race, the SCG 007 is, if nothing else, a unique piece of racing history, a rare truly independent attempt to build a car to take on the great auto manufacturers at the world's greatest endurance race. Add to this the Glickenhaus team's promise that it can be converted into a road car at "a reasonable additional cost" and this might be the most interesting one-of-one hypercar offer in the world.

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