Late last month, the 2026 World Endurance Championship sporting regulations revealed that a Success Handicap system could be introduced in the Hypercar class. It’s an idea that splits opinion – one that may seem anti-sporting at first glance, yet could actually help restore meritocracy at the heart of endurance racing.
How? By pairing it with a much lighter-touch Balance of Performance. But that also requires revised Homologation Parameters that better reflect reality.
So what needs to be done to ensure 2026 doesn’t look like 2025? And why might combining BoP and Success Handicap not be such an absurd idea after all? Here’s how it all fits together.
Can we get rid of BoP?
Yes, BoP contradicts the very essence of sporting fairness. But as we’ve explained time and again, it’s the tool the rulemakers turned to in order to control costs after the LMP1 era collapsed under its own financial excesses. And that recipe seems to have pleased manufacturers: there are currently eight manufacturers in the Hypercar class, with as many as 10 expected by 2027.
With BoP's impact on this year's form much maligned, the FIA and ACO actually proposed dropping BoP entirely for next season, or at least dropping the Manufacturer Compensation element that re-levels cars from one race to another. The idea would have been to rely solely on platform equivalence and Homologation Parameters, as is the case at the Le Mans 24 Hours.
“But they all refused,” ACO president Pierre Fillon told The Race. All except one, namely Ferrari, the favourite for both titles heading into the Bahrain finale (November 8), and the winner of the last three Le Mans 24 Hours.
Why the resistance? Because every manufacturer entered this formula knowing that this artifice – however debatable – was their best shot at being competitive. And because very few were satisfied with the Homologation Parameters at Le Mans (see below), where Ferrari – and to a lesser extent Porsche – proved significantly stronger than the competition, especially on the straight lines, despite a dual-band BoP system supposedly designed to equalise top speeds.
“Can we get rid of the BoP entirely? I don’t think so,” Porsche Motorsport vice-president Thomas Laudenbach said in early September. “We can probably nearly get rid of it because the cars hopefully will be quite close together (in case of LMH–LMDh convergence). I think that we can minimise the impact of the BoP, but don’t forget we still have a demand for controlling the budget.”
Porsche may have since decided to cancel its programme, but ironically, the WEC seems to be moving in exactly that direction.
Why the BoP process needs to change
BoP – which will get a new name in 2026 – has been one of the hot topics of 2025. The way Manufacturer Compensation has been calculated has changed multiple times throughout the year, and as the season draws to a close, even the rule-makers admit the system isn’t quite right.
“Sometimes, the best is the enemy of the good,” admits Fillon. “We wanted to perfectly equalise every car, and the result was an overcorrection that created performance gaps. We’re working to improve the system.”
In 2025, the key change was that BoP aimed to compensate 100% of the measured performance delta. The result? Colossal differences in power and weight between cars. At Fuji, Ferrari raced with 40kW (53.6hp) less power and 39kg more weight than the Peugeot 9X8 and Aston Martin Valkyrie. That shouldn’t happen again in 2026.
Why? Because it stripped the best cars of their raceability. The only way to help slower cars is to give them a vastly better power-to-weight ratio, making them rocket out of corners and practically impossible to overtake. The scenes out of the final corner at Fuji were borderline comical.
Toyota suffered from it all season, and Ferrari since its Le Mans victory. The series must put an end to this levelling-down, which makes no sporting sense. The goal was to give everyone a chance to win, instead, the fastest cars are punished and can not fight anymore on the track.
From what we understand, 2026 should introduce caps to these adjustments. Manufacturer Compensation could no longer create differences of more than 20kW or 20kg between two cars, roughly half the deltas seen in Japan. That's bad news for Peugeot, which currently runs at minimum weight and maximum power, but a step back toward meritocracy.
The question now is which races the FIA and ACO will use when calculating Manufacturer Compensation. The last three? The best two of the last three? Or should a larger sample be used to counter sandbagging attempts?
But then comes the counter-argument: if power and weight gaps are capped at just 20 units, dominant cars like Ferrari and Toyota could end up running away from the field. And that’s exactly where the Success Handicap could come in.
A necessary new ingredient?
As we reported last month, the WEC is considering applying a Success Handicap to the hypercar class next season. The system is highly divisive and does not seem to be to the liking of the majority of competitors.
We reached out to the FIA for clarification, and this was their response:
"The Success Handicap, already in place in the LMGT3 class in previous years, may also be applied in the Hypercar class, with the exception of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, if deemed necessary by WEC’s regulatory bodies (the FIA and the ACO) before the start of the season," its statement read.
"No decision has been made at this stage, and the provision has been introduced only to allow the possibility of inclusion of such an adjustment as part of the performance balancing process in 2026."
Of course, the Success Handicap would also be capped in both weight and power. But the system has proven effective – particularly in LMGT3 – and is seen by many as the fairest form of performance balancing, because it’s purely results-based and not open to subjective interpretation.
So yes, maybe Peugeot and Aston Martin will struggle at the 2026 season opener in Qatar (March 28) with only a 20kW and 20kg swing compared to Ferrari and Toyota. But if 2025’s BoP data is any indication, it won't be the case for Alpine, BMW or Cadillac. After that, the results will dictate the handicaps. It's worth a try, isn't it?
Homologation Parameters still need work
At Le Mans, the ACO and FIA don’t apply Manufacturer Compensation. The BoP there is based solely on platform equivalence and Homologation Parameters. These are determined from windtunnel data and factors such as centre of gravity, average fuel load, and more. Combined with track data and simulation tools, they define each car’s homologation baseline.
But getting that baseline right is extremely complex. Even within a single manufacturer, discrepancies between wind tunnel and track data persist, and teams constantly work to improve correlation. At Le Mans, the performance gaps were far larger than expected, including in top speed, despite the dual-band BoP.
With Sauber Technology’s windtunnel no longer available, the FIA and ACO now use the Windshear facility in North Carolina for homologation. Every car - even those not using an evolution joker - must go through it, because data can vary from one windtunnel to another.
That offers a chance to reset everything and rebuild the Homologation Parameters from scratch. However, the data recorded in a windtunnel can vary significantly from one day to the next, mainly due to temperature and pressure. This is particularly true for Windshear. Several manufacturers have informed us of this.
To ensure consistency, the FIA and ACO planned to use an ORECA 07 as a reference model, running it before each Hypercar session and applying a correction coefficient if needed. A smart idea, but one that, for reasons unknown, was not implemented.
Let’s hope that doesn’t compromise next year’s BoP, because good BoP is impossible without accurate Homologation Parameters. That’s especially true for Le Mans, the centrepiece of the season.
A first step toward convergence
While full LMH–LMDh convergence isn’t expected before 2030, the FIA and ACO have already taken steps for 2026 to reduce what LMDh teams claim are aerodynamic flexibility advantages for LMH designs.
As happened last winter, the issue of component flexibility has been clarified. LMDh manufacturers had complained that the rear wing deflection tolerance was just 2.5mm for them, compared to 5mm for LMH.
Article 3.8.4 of the LMH technical regulations has been updated to state that the rearmost part of the rear wing (if present) must deflect no more than 2.5mm vertically when a load of 100N is applied. A small but meaningful step toward technical convergence.
Additionally, the regulations now specify that when the attachments of the end plates to the bodywork are disconnected, the wing support(s) must be able to withstand a vertical load of 10kN, equally applied on the surface of the rear wing.
Plenty of differences remain, but this is a clear move in the right direction. The second step comes with the ERS, which becomes mandatory for all LMH cars homologated from 2026 onward. Aston Martin’s Valkyrie, homologated in 2025, will therefore not be required to use it.
After a season of controversy over BoP extremes and opaque adjustments, 2026 could mark a more reasoned, transparent, and technically coherent approach. A lighter BoP, refined Homologation Parameters, and a modest Success Handicap system, what if WEC has simply found its magic formula?
