OPINION: Balance of Performance is unfortunately here to stay

We're well past the half way point in the 2026 FIA World Endurance Championship season now, so it feels like a good time to review how things are going and look forward to the next four races.

The overriding thing for me this year is how well the Balance of Performance is working.

I wrote in my On The Apex newsletter this week that the race at Interlagos was super tight, with the 17 Hypercars covered by just 1.5 seconds a lap on average over the race.

It's creating close racing, with genuine on-track fights between multiple manufacturers. At Interlagos Antonio Felix da Costa and Raffaele Marciello fought for the lead, on track, at roughly four hours gone, with no safety cars used at all to close up the pack. And the Ferrari of Alessandro Pier Guidi was only a few seconds behind, catching both of them due to the squabbling up front. It was great to see.

We've seen other similar battles too. Le Mans was fought very closely between BMW, Cadillac and Toyota, with the top four cars separated by just over 30 seconds. After 24 hours of racing and only two safety cars periods to bunch the pack up, that's a finish closer than many shorter single seater races.

It's genuinely great to see how close the field is, especially after last year with Ferrari winning the first four races, including Le Mans. That said, Ferrari haven't won since, although they came very close at Interlagos last weekend.

And the same goes for LMGT3 too, where we've had three teams winning in four races, with close battles on-track and tight finishes all around.

So we know BoP works to create close, exciting racing. Which is great! My problem is that I wish we didn't need it at all.

BoP's unknown values in 2026

The big change for 2026 is the hidden BoP values for both classes in WEC. Whereas previously the power/weight values for both classes were released prior to the race weekend, this year they are completely hidden, with even the teams not having full visibility on the values and what other teams have.

This follows on from the previous rule in place about manufacturer representatives not being allowed to talk about BoP to the media, or criticise its implementation.

It led to ridiculous insinuations from teams to media where it was very clear what they were implying, but they were doing so in a way which wouldn't see them fined or penalised.

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The same rule has also been introduced to IMSA, although the BoP values are still public in the American series, for now.

As the values are hidden now, we don't get that, because the media and fans at large aren't sure what the values are – although we can make educated, rough guesses – and the teams aren't able to talk about it.

It's also not clear what the specific methodology for the calculation of BoP is, although we do know it's similar to last year, if not the same, using performance from the previous two races to calculate if a team's power/weight goes up or down.

While I think hiding BoP values from the public is a good move in terms of stopping people talking about BoP and focusing instead on the on-track action, it means we're constantly asking whether the BoP is the reason for increased performance or results.

Is Ferrari winless so far this year due to BoP? Is BMW's improved performance, taking two race wins and sitting second in the championship, down to BoP, or down to the upgrades made this year to the M Hybrid V8? Are Peugeot's continued struggles due to poor BoP, especially at Le Mans?

We don't know because the values are hidden.

BoP is fundamental to the 2030 rules

The 2030 top class prototype rules were announced at the annual pre-Le Mans press conference.

They take the LMDh ruleset which is used by the majority of Hypercar/GTP manufacturers, modifying it to suit the LMH-rules teams, which include Toyota, Ferrari, Peugeot and Aston Martin.

This means that manufacturers will be able to build their own chassis for the ruleset, just like in the current LMH ruleset. But, like in LMDh now, the cars will only be 2-wheel-drive. This means LMH manufacturers will need to build new powertrains, as theirs are currently 4WD.

I was hoping that BoP's influence in this new ruleset would be reduced or even eliminated entirely. While I'm fine with BoP in (LM)GT3 – it makes absolute sense there – BoP being used to balance bespoke prototypes in a high profile world championship, and in IMSA's top class too in North America, is the wrong move. It risks the championships feeling artificial and gimmicky.

When I spoke to multiple manufacturers earlier in the year about the new ruleset, they all wanted a single ruleset for Hypercar and GTP, to remove the awkward two-ruleset solution imposed by the ACO/IMSA convergence announced in 2020.

But Toyota's David Floury was clear that he believes BoP is the best solution, as a stricter cost cap would be difficult to implement, with some teams or manufacturers racing in multiple championships, while others are in a single championship. It would be, understandably, hard to police and monitor.

And when I talked to IMSA president John Doonan at Le Mans, he implied BoP would remain in these new regulations.

"I think that's part of the technical working group, those discussions," he told me after the ACO press conference when I asked about BoP's place in the new regulations.

"In the end we, and I know Pierre [Fillon, ACO president] and Richard [Mille, the FIA's President of the Endurance Commission] feel the same. We're all about fair and equal competition, and whatever it takes for us to get there. That is the ultimate goal."

Based on the races seen so far this year in WEC, it's not hard to see why the organisers are keen to retain BoP into the new regulations in 2030 and beyond. We've got close racing, lots of manufacturers involved, and multiple cars from different teams competing for race wins.

The new single ruleset should remove the fundamental difficulties in balancing two classes with different philosophies on power and hybrid technology, which is good. Whether it'll remove the questions about performance at individual race weekends... I'm not so sure. It's frustrating that everything tends to centre back to this discussion, but in order to keep the manufacturers levels of interest high, this is the way it has to be.

I'm enjoying the close racing and the amount of manufacturer interest, and long may that continue, as it's the main thing everyone wants to see. I'd rather have BoP and lots of manufacturers than no BoP and fewer manufacturers. But it's a shame modern motorsport needs BoP in order to get that manufacturer interest.