Jules Gounon to replace Habsburg at Alpine for Imola
Alpine Endurance Team have officially announced this morning that their official reserve driver Jules Gounon will replace Ferdinand Habsburg for the upcoming 6 Hours of Imola.
Regular driver Habsburg was injured in an accident during testing at Motorland Aragón (Spain) at the end of last month and the Austrian continues to recover at home.
Gounon is Alpine's reserve driver and the Frenchman will contest his first race behind the wheel of a prototype on a circuit he knows well, having scored a podium finish there in GT World Challenge Europe in 2022.
BREAKING: Jules Gounon will replace Ferdinand Habsburg for Alpine this weekend
— FIA World Endurance Championship (@FIAWEC) April 15, 2024
The news follows Ferdinand’s continued recovery from an injury sustained during testing.#WEC #6HImola #Alpine pic.twitter.com/vPjClCnccv
Philippe Sinault, Alpine Endurance Team Principal, commented: “Ferdinand will be on our minds. It is a hard blow, but that is part of the life of a team, and everything is in place to ensure that he is with us thanks to modern communication methods. We've decided to replace him with Jules at Imola. It's never easy to make your debut in such a context, but Jules was identified, selected and signed to fill this role, even though we never imagined it would happen so early like this. He's fundamentally ready but still has much to learn, even if he has already demonstrated his mastery of several aspects, given his track record in GT. We honed his preparation during our latest tests with his six teammates and then in the simulator to prepare him for all our processes. This weekend promises to be extraordinarily instructive for the whole team."
Round two of FIA WEC gets underway at Imola in northern Italy this Friday (19 April) with two 90-minute free practice sessions. A final one-hour session will precede qualifying and the Hyperpole on Saturday before the 6 hour race on Sunday.
