Ferrari will continue with an unchanged Hypercar class driver line-up in next year’s World Endurance Championship.

Antonello Coletta, Ferrari’s head of sportscar racing, confirmed on Sunday that the #50 499P Le Mans Hypercar will be raced in 2025 by Antonio Fuoco, Nicklas Nielsen and Miguel Molina and #51 by James Calado, Alessandro Pier Guidi and Antonio Giovinazzi for a third consecutive season.

The announcement made at the Ferrari World Finals for its one-make challenge series at Imola followed news announced on Saturday that Fuoco and Molina had renewed their factory contracts for next year.

Calado and Pier Guidi were granted contract extensions this time last year.

Coletta explained that there was no reason to make changes to the driver roster for the third campaign by the factory AF Corse team in the WEC.

“It is confirmed: #50 and #51 will not change – we will have the same drivers,” he said. “The #50 and #51 will be exactly the same.

#51 Ferrari AF Corse Ferrari 499P: Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

“We are happy with the line-ups: we have won with both at the Le Mans 24 Hours [with #51 in 2023 and #50 in ’24].”

Coletta stressed the importance of “consistency and continuity” in terms of the drivers on its Hypercar squad.

“When we started with the 499P and chose our GT pilots some people were not happy,” he continued.

“But even the sceptics have had to change their minds. All six 499P drivers have won Le Mans, which I think validates our choices.”

There has been no confirmation of the drivers for the #83 satellite entry run by AF Corse on a customer basis and driven this year by Robert Kubica, Yifei Ye and Robert Shwartzman

Coletta outlined a hope to “announce it just before the Bahrain race” [this year’s WEC final on 2 November.

He ruled out Arthur Leclerc, brother of Ferrari F1 driver Charles, racing the car next year, even though he is scheduled to test one of the 499Ps in the WEC rookie test at Bahrain the day after the season finale.

Coletta explained that the younger of the Leclerc brothers, who is listed as a development driver for the F1 team, still needed to learn about sportscar racing.

He was placed by Ferrari for this year in the endurance segment of the Italian GT Championship, which he is contesting alongside his LMP2 commitments in the European Le Mans Series with Panis Racing.

“Our goal is for Arthur to keep learning about endurance and then there might be the chance for him to catch an opportunity in one of our prototypes in the future,” said Coletta.

Davide Rigon, Alessio Rovera, Daniel Serra and Lilou Wadoux, who are all part of the Ferrari factory roster of GT3 drivers, have also had their contracts extended into next year.

Johnny Eblen is the latest fighter to criticize the “Cowboy” comeback.

Longtime UFC veteran Donald Cerrone recently announced he plans to come out of retirement in pursuit of being the first fighter to log 50 in-cage appearances across the UFC and WEC. His return has been met with criticism from several of his peers, especially given that Cerrone has admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs while out of competition.

Eblen was asked about an existing issue with Cerrone and he explained that he doesn’t approve of Cerrone fighting again.

“I just don’t think it’s a good idea to retire, take a bunch of steroids and then come back and fight again,” Eblen said, speaking to the media at the PFL Battle of the Giants on Saturday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. “It’s not a good look. I think Conor [McGregor] paved the way, I think he’s influencing a lot of other people to do it, and I think people are trying to fight past their prime and use all these substances and it’s just not natural, it’s not good.

“Your brain doesn’t heal from steroids. So all that CTE just adds up. I’m very against steroids, I’m very against people fighting past their prime.”

Cerrone turned 41 this past March. It is not yet known if the UFC will accept his request to step into the octagon again, but UFC CEO Dana White shared his opinion on the matter saying, “Love him, hate that.”

As far as Conor McGregor goes, while the former two-division champion has noticeably bulked up at various points during his break from competition dating back to July 2021, he has never officially failed a drug test. After injuring his leg against Dustin Poirier at UFC 264, McGregor was subsequently removed from the drug-testing pool until he began being tested again in October 2023.

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Renan Ferreira is staying positive despite coming up short in the biggest bout of his career.

The 2023 PFL heavyweight champion suffered a first-round TKO to former UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou in the main event of PFL: Battle of the Giants – which went down on Saturday in Saudi Arabia.

Ferreira (13-4) gave all the credit to Ngannou (18-3), and assures he’ll come back stronger from this defeat.

“Hey guys, Renan ‘Problema’ here, a bit broken,” Ferreira said in Portuguese on his Instagram Stories. “Yesterday wasn’t a good day at work, guys, but I’m very happy with all our dedication and everything that developed through our work. I’ve always had the mindset of never losing, for myself, to fight any lack of dedication and commitment, and thank God I have a clean conscience. I worked very hard there, showed up well to the fight, and was happy to return.

“Unfortunately, my opponent was superior. He managed to impose a game where that I couldn’t defend the takedowns, which led to very hard ground-and-pound to get through. And that’s it, life goes on, we’ll be back. I want to thank everyone for all the love and support, we’re always together. Hugs.”

With the defeat, Ferreira saw his four-fight winning streak come to an end. He entered PFL: Battle of the Giants off his best career stretch, as he had knockout wins over Matheus Scheffel, Maurice Greene, Denis Goltsov, and Bellator heavyweight champion Ryan Bader.

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for PFL: Battle of the Giants.