Signatech

Template:Short description Signatech, currently competing as the Alpine Endurance Team, is a French auto racing team and racing car constructor that competes in the FIA World Endurance Championship. Signatech has been a long-term partner for Alpine since 2013, and has been responsible for running their Le Mans Prototype race cars in the WEC, most notably in the LMP2 class and more recently stepping up to the Le Mans Hypercar class with Alpine's A424 sports prototype. Alpine purchased a stake in Signatech in 2024.

Racing history

File:AlpineEnduranceTeamLogo.jpeg

Alpine Endurance Team Logo

The team won the FIA European Formula Three Cup in 1999 with Benoît Tréluyer. It won the French Formula Three Championship in 2000 with Jonathan Cochet as driver, who also won the European Cup and Masters of Formula 3 that year, and won the Korea Super Prix for the team in 2001. In 2002, Renaud Derlot won the European F3 Cup for the team.

In 2003, Signature won the team championship in the first Formula Renault V6 Eurocup, with Tristan Gommendy and Kosuke Matsuura as drivers. They moved from the defunct French F3 series to its replacement, the Formula 3 Euro Series, and Nicolas Lapierre and Fabio Carbone completed a 1–2 finish for the team at the prestigious Macau Grand Prix. Edoardo Mortara and Jean-Karl Vernay repeated this feat in 2009. The team began competing in the 2009 European Le Mans Series in the LMP1 category.

The 2010 season was an outstanding one for Signature in the F3 Euroseries with Edoardo Mortara and Marco Wittmann finishing first and second in the series, winning eight races between them, and also taking the team championship.

Signatech provided the chassis for the Formula Future Fiat, a junior formula racing series in Brazil held in 2010 and 2011.

File:Le Mans 2011 Signatech Nissan.jpg

Signatech Nissan at the 2011 24 Hours of Le Mans

In 2011, in cooperation with the Nissan GT Academy, Signatech finished second in LMP2 at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

In 2012, Signature decided to pull out of the Formula 3 Euro Series, to concentrate on its involvement in sport car races.

The team finished tenth overall at the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans using a Nissan-powered Oreca 03.

In 2013, Alpine partnered with Signatech to run an LMP2 car in the European Le Mans Series with French drivers Pierre Ragues and Nelson Panciatici. Signatech won the LMP2 Team's and Driver's championships.

In 2014, Signatech delivered chassis for the Formula 4 Sudamericana.

In 2015, Signatech, continuing its partnership with Alpine, returned to the FIA World Endurance Championship, winning the championship LMP2 category in 2016 and 2018–19.

File:Alpine, GIMS 2018, Le Grand-Saconnex (1X7A1670).jpg

The Alpine A110 GT4 is built by Signatech for Alpine

In 2020, Signatech returned to the European Le Mans Series under the name of Richard Mille Racing Team. The team previously planned to run an all-female lineup of Tatiana Calderón, Katherine Legge and Sophia Flörsch, however, due to Legge's injury, she was then replaced by André Negrão for the first two rounds. Beitske Visser would then take over Legge's place for the rest of the season. The team would then join the LMP2 class of the 2021 FIA World Endurance Championship, with an all-female lineup of Tatiana Calderón, Beitske Visser and Sophia Flörsch.

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Signatech's Alpine A480 at the 2022 24 Hours of Le Mans

In 2021, the team partnered again with Alpine, this time fielding a "grandfathered" Rebellion R13 in the Le Mans Hypercar class for the 2021 FIA World Endurance Championship season, which finished third overall at the 2021 24 Hours of Le Mans. The team continued with this lineup in 2022. For 2023, Signatech returned to the LMP2 category with two Oreca 07s;

File:Alpine Endurance Team - Alpine A424 -36 (53815731028).jpg

The No. 36 A424 being driven at the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans

They returned to the top class of the World Endurance Championship in 2024 with two Alpine A424s.The French manufacturer managed a fourth place in the standings, with the highlight being a third-place finish in the 6 Hours of Fuji.

Racing record

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Entrant	No.	Car	Drivers	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2009	Template:Flagicon Signature Plus	12	Courage-Oreca LC70E-Judd	Template:Flagicon Didier André Template:Flagicon Franck Mailleux Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues	LMP1	344	11th	10th
2010	Template:Flagicon Signature Plus	008	Lola-Aston Martin B09/60	Template:Flagicon Vanina Ickx Template:Flagicon Franck Mailleux Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues	LMP1	302	DNF	DNF
2011	Template:Flagicon Signatech Nissan	26	Oreca 03-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Soheil Ayari Template:Flagicon Franck Mailleux Template:Flagicon Lucas Ordóñez	LMP2	320	9th	2nd
2012	Template:Flagicon Signatech Nissan	23	Oreca 03-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Olivier Lombard Template:Flagicon Franck Mailleux Template:Flagicon Jordan Tresson	LMP2	340	16th	9th
		26		Template:Flagicon Nelson Panciatici Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues Template:Flagicon Roman Rusinov		351	10th	4th
2013	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine	36	Alpine A450-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Tristan Gommendy Template:Flagicon Nelson Panciatici Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues	LMP2	317	14th	8th
2014	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine	36	Alpine A450b-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Paul-Loup Chatin Template:Flagicon Nelson Panciatici Template:Flagicon Oliver Webb	LMP2	355	7th	3rd
2015	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine	36	Alpine A450b-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Vincent Capillaire Template:Flagicon Paul-Loup Chatin Template:Flagicon Nelson Panciatici	LMP2	110	DNF	DNF
2016	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine	36	Alpine A460-Nissan	Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon Gustavo Menezes Template:Flagicon Stéphane Richelmi	LMP2	357	5th	1st
2017	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine Matmut	35	Alpine A470-Gibson	Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Nelson Panciatici Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues	LMP2	362	4th	3rd
		36		Template:Flagicon Romain Dumas Template:Flagicon Gustavo Menezes Template:Flagicon Matt Rao		351	10th	8th
2018	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine Matmut	36	Alpine A470-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Pierre Thiriet	LMP2	367	5th	1st
2019	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine Matmut	36	Alpine A470-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Pierre Thiriet	LMP2	368	6th	1st
2020	Template:Flagicon Signatech Alpine Elf	36	Alpine A470-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Thomas Laurent Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Pierre Ragues	LMP2	367	8th	4th
	Template:Flagicon Richard Mille Racing Team	50	Oreca 07-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Tatiana Calderón Template:Flagicon Sophia Flörsch Template:Flagicon Beitske Visser		364	13th	9th
2021	Template:Flagicon Alpine Elf Matmut	36	Alpine A480-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Matthieu Vaxivière	Hypercar	367	3rd	3rd
	Template:Flagicon Richard Mille Racing Team	1	Oreca 07-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Tatiana Calderón Template:Flagicon Sophia Flörsch Template:Flagicon Beitske Visser	LMP2	74	DNF	DNF
2022	Template:Flagicon Alpine Elf Team	36	Alpine A480-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Matthieu Vaxivière	Hypercar	362	23rd	5th
	Template:Flagicon Richard Mille Racing Team	1	Oreca 07-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Charles Milesi Template:Flagicon Sébastien Ogier Template:Flagicon Lilou Wadoux	LMP2	366	13th	9th
2023	Template:Flagicon Alpine Elf Team	35	Oreca 07-Gibson	Template:Flagicon Olli Caldwell Template:Flagicon André Negrão Template:Flagicon Memo Rojas	LMP2	322	19th	9th
		36		Template:Flagicon Julien Canal Template:Flagicon Charles Milesi Template:Flagicon Matthieu Vaxivière		327	12th	4th
2024	Template:Flagicon Alpine Endurance Team	35	Alpine A424	Template:Flagicon Paul-Loup Chatin Template:Flagicon Ferdinand Habsburg Template:Flagicon Charles Milesi	Hypercar	75	DNF	DNF
		36		Template:Flagicon Nicolas Lapierre Template:Flagicon Mick Schumacher Template:Flagicon Matthieu Vaxivière		88	DNF	DNF
2025	Template:Flagicon Alpine Endurance Team	35	Alpine A424	Template:Flagicon Paul-Loup Chatin Template:Flagicon Ferdinand Habsburg Template:Flagicon Charles Milesi	Hypercar	385	9th	9th
		36		Template:Flagicon Jules Gounon Template:Flagicon Frédéric Makowiecki Template:Flagicon Mick Schumacher		384	10th	10th

Timeline

Current series/events
24 Hours of Le Mans	2009–present
FIA World Endurance Championship	2012, 2015–present
Former series
French Formula Three Championship	1993–2002
French Formula Renault Championship	2000, 2002
Formula Renault V6 Eurocup	2003
Formula 3 Euro Series	2003–2011
Formula Renault 3.5 Series	2008
European Le Mans Series	2009–2010, 2013–2014, 2020
FIA Formula 3 European Championship	2014–2015