Centenary 24 Hours of Le Mans, Introduction

The chateaus of the Loire Valley are symbols of the gorgeous countryside of western France.  There is history and tradition here in this sleepy hamlet, as the Loire River and its tributary, La Sarthe, cuts through the green, rolling fields, on their way to the Atlantic Ocean.  It’s a place time has nearly forgotten.  In June each year, this quiet little spot in France is jolted to life with the sound of sports car engines, as the 24 Hours of Le Mans comes to town.  The advent of summer is celebrated with a motorcar race like no other on the face of this planet.  The knights of the FIA World Endurance Championship come to joust on roads south of the city of Le Mans.  Business never ends as the Café du Tertre Rouge and Restaurant de 24 Heures illustrate.  The restaurants and hotels will be filled to the brim even as the cars race past only feet away.  

“France.  A green and historic land of thousand-year-old churches, and a thousand rivers cutting through the rolling countryside of one of Europe’s oldest nations.  It is a land where every village boasts a priory, or a towering abbey.  A vineyard, or a hotel gastronomique.  Here in the west, the great river is La Sarthe with its ancient water mills and stone bridges.  It’s waterside family chateau, and it’s weeping willows.  Here also, is Le Mans, that eighth city of France, and its nearby circuit permanente de la Sarthe, home of the world’s most famous motor race, the Le Mans 24 Hours, on the circuit that is half road half racetrack, as the fans make the pilgrimage.  The bustle of traffic has been replaced by endurance race cars battling for honors in the world’s greatest motorsport event, as the FIA World Endurance Championship continues."

This year’s Le Mans has the best prototype entry for a quarter of a century thanks to the new rules seeing the Hypercar class come to the fore.  The world’s attention just may be focused for the race on Toyota and Toyota Gazoo Racing.  The Japanese brand which is one of if not the largest automaker on the globe, looking for their fourth win in four years of Hypercar competition, and their sixth consecutive overall win at Le Mans dating back to the waning years of the LMP1 era.  Their GR010 Hybrid Hypercar is going for four wins on the bounce with its 3.5-liter twin turbo V6 engine, several V6 or V8 powered cars in the Hypercar class as those seem to be the preferred engine configurations among the manufacturers.  The factory Toyota team have prepared two cars.  One for 2021 champions Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, and Jose Maria Lopez, and the other for Brendon Hartley, Ryo Hirakawa, and four-time Le Mans winner, Sebastien Buemi.

Buemi has tied the mark with such legends as Olivier Gendebien, Henri Pescarolo, and Yannick Dalmas.  Cadillac have three cars entered this year in their first effort at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in over two decades.  Two cars for Cadillac Racing with Chip Ganassi Racing, and one, for Action Express Racing.  Ganassi Racing returns to Le Mans after a few years away having succeeded in the GTE ranks with Ford and the GT while multiple IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship race and championship winners, and three-time Rolex 24 at Daytona as well as Sebring 12 Hours, 6 Hours of Watkins Glen, and Petit Le Mans winners Action Express, make their debut at Le Mans under team owner and managing director Bob Johnson, team manager Gary Nelson, race team operations director Chris Mitchum, and technical director Ian Watt, among others.

Action Express is reuniting their winning trio from this year’s 12 Hours of Sebring that the team triumphed at in dominant fashion back in March with Brazilian ace sports car racer Pipo “The Dynamo” Derani, and Englishmen Alexander Sims and Jack Aitken aboard Cadillac V LMDh #311.  Sims and Aitken in their first year as drivers with Action Express and already accomplishing a ton to bring the team to the highest level in today’s sports car endurance racing world.  Action Express Expect to Win and they are going to give it everything in their first Le Mans race.  The Daytona, Sebring, Watkins Glen, and Petit Le Mans triumphs in IMSA mean a lot.  Can you imagine if an American team with an American car went to victory lane at Le Mans?

All Cadillac’s racing at Le Mans are reliant on the newly developed 5.5 liter naturally aspirated, LMC55 32 valve Double Overhead Cam V8 motor.  Ganassi Racing’s car #2 will be piloted by former Le Mans winner Earl Bamber from Australia and his British co-drivers Alex Lynn and Richard Westbrook.  They have brought their main IMSA car over from the states, from the WeatherTech Championship to compete as well, carrying the #3.  Frenchman Sebastien Bourdais, a native Le Mans resident, leads the team alongside New Zealander Scott Dixon (multiple IndyCar champion), and Dutchman Renger van der Zande.

The English Vanwall nameplate returns to racing after a long absence after racing in Formula 1 successfully in the late 1950s.  The Vanwall Vandervell 680 in it’s distinctive two-tone green colors is powered by a 4.5-liter Gibson Technologies naturally aspirated V8 engine, a motor that has lived in the Rebellion and Alpine LMP1 cars of the recent past.  A note should be that the Vanwall driver lineup has changed.  F1 and Indianapolis winner Villeneuve’s wife is expecting their first child and so, Villeneuve has made the conscious decision to not compete at Le Mans this year.  The Canadian F1 champion has been replaced in the Vanwall lineup by endurance racing veteran and race winner, Frenchman Tristan Vautier, in his first drive in a Le Mans Hypercar.

Porsche is back at Le Mans for the first time since winning in 2017 with the all-conquering 919 Hybrid LMP1 car that took a hat trick of wins in 2015, 2016, and 2017.  This time, they are campaigning three of the new 963 LMDh hybrid prototypes with Porsche Penske Motorsports and the ageless legend, Roger Penske.  Two cars from their FIA World Endurance Championship season long effort, and one car to be driven by their dedicated pilots in the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship.  The Porsche 963’s powered by the new 9RD motor, a 4.6-liter twin turbo V8 which is a derivative and continuation of the 3.4 liter turbo V8 Penske used in the Porsche RS Spyder LMP2 car between 2006 and 2008 in their duels with Audi’s diesel LMP1 cars in the old American Le Mans Series.

Car #5, the lead entry is to be driven by American Dane Cameron alongside Dane Michael Christensen and Frenchman Fred Makowiecki.  The second factory FIA WEC 963, #6 is set to be driven by France’s Kevin Estre, former Le Mans winner with Audi and Porsche, Andre Lotterer of Germany, and Belgium’s Laurens Vanthoor.  The third entry is the IMSA WeatherTech Championship 963 carrying #75 in reference to Porsche’s 75th anniversary.  Brazilian Daytona Prototype International IMSA champion Felipe Nasr sharing with former Porsche overall Le Mans winner Nick Tandy of England, and Frenchman Matthieu Jaminet, a longtime campaigner for the Porsche factory in the old GT Le Mans IMSA and GTE Pro FIA WEC categories.

There is a sole privateer Porsche 963 as well in addition to the factory cars.  Porsche is doing with the 963 just what they did in the Group C heyday of the 1980s and running factory and customer cars alike.  Jota Sport from England, stalwarts in the LMP2 class, have just recently moved up a notch to Hypercar and are in their second ever Hypercar race with their famous #38 led by Portuguese driver Antonio Felix Da Costa sharing with Englishman Will Stevens and Chinese sports car racing veteran Yifei Ye.

For the first time in half a century, Ferrari have returned to world class sports car racing with a factory effort.  The last time they won Le Mans was way back in 1965 with the 250P sports prototype of Masten Gregory, Jochen Rindt, and Ed Hugus for Luigi Chinetti’s North American Racing Team.  This year, Amato Ferrari (coincidentally, no relation to the great Enzo Ferrari who founded the company), and his AF Corse team have two of the brand-new 499P Hyper cars entered in the WEC and at Le Mans with their 3-liter turbo V6 engines.  Car #50 of Italy’s Antonio Fuoco, Spain’s Miguel Molina, and Danish driver Nicklas Nielsen is the lead entry.   

The sister #51 499P is to be driven by Italian’s Alessandro Pier Guidi and Antonio Giovinazzi (former Alfa Romeo Formula 1 driver), and by James Calado of England.  Many of Ferrari’s drivers have stepped up to the Hypercar team from their GTE team in years past and the same can be said of Porsche in that respect.  The factory hot rods in GTE Pro went away to make room for the Hypercars as the factory focus for the future of endurance sports car racing.  Peugeot are back at Le Mans for the first time since the early 2010s after winning the race for a third time in 2009 with their 908 HDI FAP diesel LMP1 entry and of course winning back-to-back at the end of the Group C prototype era in 1992 and ’93 with the all-conquering Formula 1 V10 powered 905.

This time around it is the 9X8 hyper car.  The only prototype in the field that does not make use of a traditional rear wing.  Like Toyota and Ferrari, Peugeot have eschewed the V8 and have opted for V6 turbo propulsion in the form of a 2.6-liter turbo motor.  The Peugeot TotalEnergies team, like all the other Hypercar class entries, is stacked with talent.  Scotsman Paul di Resta leads the #93 car alongside Dane Mikkel Jensen and Frenchman, (in his home race, driving for the home team), Jean Eric Vergne.  Loic Duval, too, will be expected to deliver for his country and for Peugeot as the lead driver in the sister #94 9X8 he pilots alongside American Gustavo Menezes and Swiss driver Nico Muller, a man who made his name in GT3 racing and in the old Class 1 touring car days of the DTM.

Then, there is the other American manufacturer on the opposite end of the spectrum from the might of giant General Motors and the Cadillac division.  Jim Glickenhaus coming again to Le Mans for a third year with his own team and his own designed car which though it is an American’s name, the car has a lot of French and Italian influence.  It hearkens back to the prototype racers of the ‘60s and ’70s in it’s design while also being completely modern with power from it’s French built and maintained Pipo Moteurs 3.5-liter V8 which is essentially two 1.8 liter four cylinder Rallycross race car motors welded together at the crankcase.

Glickenhaus finished as high as third in this race before (scoring a podium in 2022 behind Toyota’s), and like Cadillac will do all they can to bring Le Mans glory back to America.  Car #708 is their lead entry to be driven by Australian Ryan Briscoe and Frenchmen Romain Dumas and Olivier Pla.  The second Glickenhaus 007 LMH (to give the car it’s proper model designation) has one of their original drivers, Frenchman Franck Mailleux, at the wheel of it, alongside two newcomers to the team, French sports car racer Nathaniel Berthon, and Mexican former Formula 1 driver, Esteban Guttierez.

It's the centenary of Le Mans!  This is only the prototype class.  The biggest field of Le Mans Hypercars ever assembled at 16 strong from seven different brands, both household names in the auto industry, and dreamers who want to build a car of their very own and come and play with the big boys.  That is the intent of the Hypercar category.  We will talk about them, the LMP2, and the GT cars during the race, and don't forget the special entry, the massive and awesome Garage 56 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 NASCAR Cup car modified for endurance racing.  It should be the most competitive Le Mans in more than a generation.  I can’t wait!

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Hey, folks.  Before the race, we are going to have some bonus content.  So, check that out, too.