They may be missing from the action of this year’s TUDOR United SportsCar Championship but the Dodge Viper will return to action at this year’s Le Mans 24 Hour.

After shutting down the factory GTLM effort last year, a GT Daytona class Viper effort run by Bill Riley for Ben Keating was successful with victory at the Rolex 24.

Now Keating, Jeroen Bleekemolen and Marc Miller will drive a GTLM spec at Le Mans in what is called the GTE class – same cars – different name.

This car is taking the place left vacant by the withdrawal of one of the two cars, the no. 39 Morgan Evo-SARD, originally entered by the Sard Morand team.

The Viper’s last outing in the Le Mans 24 Hours was in 2013 when SRT Motorsports entered two GTS-Rs.

Prior to the Le Mans 24 Hours the test day will take place on Sunday 31st May 2015. The ACO has received 65 entry requests. At present the entry list accepts 64 cars. All those entered for the race are down to run in this free practice session as well as the two current reserves in the LM P category (the no. 44 Ibanez Racing Oreca 03R-Nissan and the KCMG Oreca 03R-Nissan).

Two reserves in LM GTE (the no. 60 Formula Racing Ferrari 458 Italia and the no. 86 Gulf Racing UK Porsche), and two additional Ferraris run by AF Corse with the numbers 81 and 82.

As the new LM P3s are allowed to take part in the test day (but not in the Le Mans 24 Hours), the two LNT Ginetta-Nissans have been selected with the Scuderia Villorba Corse as a reserve. It will be allowed to participate if a place becomes free in the pits.

Drivers include Olympic cycling legend Sir Chris Hoy (pictured above) who won on debut in the LMP3 class at Silverstone. Hoy is a six-time Olympic Gold medalist and 11-time World Champion on two-wheels.