Phil Hanson told Motorsport Week how he wishes success for JOTA ahead of his final FIA World Endurance Championship race for them in Bahrain.
The 25-year-old wished good fortune for his current team JOTA, ahead of their 2025 venture with Cadillac.
AF Corse announced Hanson as a 2025 driver prior to this weekend’s 8 Hours of Bahrain season finale, so he spoke ahead of his final race with them.
“JOTA is a really good team and I’ve really enjoyed my time here.
“I think the environment is fantastic… and the engineering personnel capabilities of JOTA are very impressive.
“I wish them well but not too well because I’ll be fighting them, but [driving for them next year] was definitely something I was open to.
“AF Corse knew [Robert Shwartzman] was moving on with his career and to other ventures outside of endurance.
“So I think at that point [latter half of 2024] the conversation started between Amato [Ferrari – AF Corse founder], me and my manager.”
Hanson made his step up to the top WEC category for the 2024 season with JOTA, a customer team using the Porsche 963 LMDh package.
Jenson Button and Oliver Rasmussen co-drives the #38 with Hanson, and will do so for the final time as a trio on Saturday 2 November.
Hanson on ‘struggling’ to get results in 2024
“I think it’s been a very strong year, but I think we’ve really struggled to get results this year in terms of how the races have panned out.
“Silly penalties, reliability issues, other things like this,” he added.
“I can’t remember the last year I’ve had multiple DNFs this year across both IMSA and WEC,” he said, with two non-finishes in each series.
“It’s been very disappointing from that perspective because some of those DNFs have rose from events where we’ve been quite strong.
“I hope that I’m forward-paying my bad luck so hoping for a very clean season next year – and to perform the same that I have been this year and just get the results that, I feel, I’ve deserved this year.”
Last time out at the 6 Hours of Fuji, Hanson and his #38 co-drivers recorded their best finish of the season so far in sixth, so they will aim for more in Bahrain.
The youngest WEC LMP2 champion and Le Mans LMP2 class-winner will then undertake his first laps of the #83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P on Sunday morning.
READ MORE: WEC Preview: What to know for the Bahrain season finale
