Le Mans: 100 years of motorsport at its limit

When the big event starts on 10 June 2023 it will literally be the race of the century. The annual endurance motor race that’s officially called 24 Hours of Le Mans – but usually goes by the simpler nickname of ‘Le Mans’ – will be celebrating 100 years since its inaugural outing, during which time there have been 93 meetings. The anomaly here is explained by the race being suspended during and immediately after the Second World War.

A century ago it was called the Grand Prix d’Endurance de 24 Heures, but the principle has remained the same. The world’s longest-running motor-racing event is won by the car that covers the greatest distance in 24 hours. Not only a showcase for the drivers, it has always been a chance for car designers and engineers to advertise their skills in keeping a car running at speeds well over 200mph (320km/h) without mechanical failure.

Small wonder that Danish racing driver Tom Kristensen – nine-times winner and one of the all-​time greats of Le Mans – says that the race “takes the best out of everyone”. He backs up his point by explaining the scale of the challenge: “You do more kilometres in that one race than Formula One do in a season, and probably a higher average speed. We average about 220km/h including pit stops and cover nearly 5,000km.”

When French driver Loïc Duval won the 2013 meeting, he said: “Le Mans is a great race that evokes so many emotions and is so tiring. Now I’ve really got to restrain myself to keep from shedding tears.” In the 1971 movie ‘Le Mans’, Hollywood legend Steve McQueen’s character Michael Delaney sums it up differently: “When you’re racing, it’s life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting.”

Perhaps it’s no surprise that motor racing was so radically different a century ago, but it nevertheless seems strange that drivers in the inaugural Grand Prix of Endurance (as it was called in 1923) didn’t wear goggles despite the driving hail and rain that plagued the race. With regulations set by the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (which is still the organising entity for Le Mans), the contest was to be run on a 17.26km (10.72-mile) circuit located in the city of Le Mans in Sarthe in the Pays de la Loire, France.

According to the rules, with some exceptions for two-seaters, the cars had to be standard four-seater production models that carried 60kg of lead ballast to compensate for the weight of passengers (which were not permitted) and had to be equipped with rear-view mirrors and audible warning devices. Because the aim of the Grand Prix of Endurance was to establish the car with the best performance over three consecutive years, the 1923 event effectively had no winner to lift the Rudge-Whitworth Triennial Cup. But the event that was instigated to display to the public automotive engineering and manufacturing excellence, was ultimately deemed a success due to 30 (of 37) cars finishing – a total that would not be equalled for another 70 years.

Cars were painted in their national racing colours, which meant that most were in French blue, with two Belgian Excelsiors in yellow, and the sole British entrant, a Bentley, in green.

You don’t get to be a hundred years old without becoming set in your ways, and the great race that is Le Mans is no different. Although the technology involved has become more sophisticated by orders of magnitude with the passing of time, the way the race starts remained unchanged for almost half a century. First up is that the drivers race in teams, using just the one car, and the race originally started with the drivers not even seated in the vehicle. When the flag dropped, they ran across the track to their cars, started their engines and then set off.

Six-times winner of Le Mans, Belgian driver Jacky Ickx had always considered this ‘land rush’ start to be dangerous, and in 1969 famously walked to his car in protest, deliberately taking his time to ensure the safety harness was fitted correctly. Despite starting last, he went on to take the chequered flag in first place. His action proved to be tragically prescient when British driver John Woolfe was fatally thrown from the cockpit following a crash on the first lap, having failed – as many drivers did – to secure his safety belt or close the door properly.

In 1970 this set-up was modified for safety reasons so that the race shifted to a ‘standing start’ with the drivers already buckled into their cars. The following year this changed again, when for the first time the race began from a rolling start. Which is how it’s still done.

The 1920s was a blur of technological firsts as engineers grasped the benefits of a streamlined body. In 1925, the Chenard & Walcker Tank laid the foundations for aerodynamic research that ultimately led to the rebodied 1950s Cadillac Coupé DeVille. In the 1970s, Porsche developed a car shaped like an aircraft wing: the 917K that went on to beat the distance record in 1971 by covering 5,335.31km.

The track’s evolution led to innovations in road surfacing by combining chalk chippings with a tar/bitumen emulsion, which was then covered with tar-coated grit. In 1926, the addition of the fog lamp by Lorraine-Dietrich engineers contributed to their landslide victory, while 1927 saw the introduction of front-wheel drive in the form of the Tracta that came seventh (at the same time Citroën introduced the principle on a vehicle it named Traction).

1949 saw the introduction of the Renault 4CV rear engine that retired due to engine trouble. Despite Enzo Ferrari declaring that “horses pull the plough, not push it”, the Italian manufacturer was the first to claim victory with a rear-engine car in 1963.

The 1950s saw the introduction of radial tyres, direct-injection engines and disc brakes, while the big breakthroughs of the 1960s were quartz iodine headlamps (followed by LED in 2011 and laser in 2014), gas turbine engines and downforce spoilers. Rotary engines were followed by hybrids in the 1990s. The first hybrid car to win the race was the Audi R18 e-Tron in 2012.

For a century, Le Mans – the jewel in the crown of the WEC (World Endurance Championship) calendar – has been a testbed for new technology. And with the 2021 creation of the Hypercar class, the WEC continues the tradition of showcasing automotive design. The governing motorsport body, the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), says that Hypercar class “is the top-tier category ... open to both specialised prototypes and cars based around road-going vehicles”. The class is divided into two types: LMD (Le Mans Hypercar, from 2021) and LMDh (Le Mans Daytona h, from 2022). So what can we expect to see in the Hypercar in terms of engineering and technology? The FIA says that technical regulations are “focused on controlling performance outcome instead of setting design or geometrical restrictions”. With Hypercar there is a shift in philosophy to ‘performance windows’ where limit values are set for areas such as power unit and aerodynamic performance, with each of the cars having to fit into those windows. Power is set at 500kW, while minimum weight is 1,030kg. Meanwhile cost-saving and safety improvement measures come in, while the rule-set allows manufacturers greater variety in terms of technical approach as well as aesthetics. This flexibility allows designers to maintain the “spirit of the brand” while “remaining relevant to their road car philosophy”. The FIA claims that the class will usher in a “new golden era”, with multiple manufacturers – Cadillac, Ferrari, Glickenhaus, Peugeot, Porsche, Toyota and Vanwall – pledging their support to the WEC series.

Italian-American driver Mario Andretti, who retired from competing at Le Mans in 2000, once famously said that while the spectators remember the crashes, what haunts those behind the wheel are the near misses. Over the past century there have been plenty of both, the most serious of which have accounted for 21 driver fatalities – 16 during the race itself and five during pre-race practice. The first lethal accident, which happened in 1925, didn’t even occur on the track: André Guilbert was in fact en route to the meeting when he was hit head-​on by a van speeding on the wrong side of the road. A day later, on 20 June Marius Mestivier spun out of control on his 18^th lap either due to a blown tyre or, as some reports claim, having been hit by a bird. The accident happened on the Mulsanne Straight – where more than half of the Le Mans deaths have occurred – that once saw speeds of 400km/h (250mph). In order to limit maximum speeds (and to reduce engine and tyre failures) on the straight, two chicanes were added before the 1990 race.

Le Mans’ darkest hour was the 1955 disaster when large pieces of debris flew into the crowd, killing 83 spectators and French driver Pierre Levegh, while injuring nearly 180 more. It was the most catastrophic crash in motorsport history. The incident caused the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) to set about making extensive track improvements and infrastructure changes at the Circuit de la Sarthe.

There are two fundamental qualities you need to be a racing driver: money and talent. And while there are plenty of celebrities that are dripping with the former, not so many have got the expertise to drive in the world’s most iconic motor race. Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason ticks both boxes. Having amassed a personal wealth of around £150m, the ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ and ‘Wish You Were Here’ rock legend first raced at Le Mans in 1979 a few months after ‘The Wall’ was released. Driving a Lola T297, he finished 18^th, his best result in five appearances. When asked which of his albums he’d like to listen to while driving, Mason replied: “I can’t think of anything more distracting than having music playing while racing.”

Also competing in 1979 was an all-time great of the silver screen Paul Newman, who had more success than Mason, taking a class victory and second overall at a soaking wet Le Mans. Other entertainers to have been behind the wheel at the circuit include ‘X-Men’ actor Michael Fassbender (described by teammate Richard Lietz as “not the most natural talent”), as well as Patrick Dempsey of ‘Grey’s Anatomy’, who on his third attempt in 2015 ended up on the podium with a second-place finish. Steve McQueen, who starred in the fictional movie ‘Le Mans’ (1971), despite being a competitive driver in real life never raced at Le Mans.