1983 Le Mans

1983 — $265,000. Plus spares. The public price of a Le Mans victory. Porsche was selling its 956. It was their business. And the A.C.O. made it easier for everyone. The catalog of classes and sub-classes were gone. Only Group C, C Junior (only 85-liter fuel tanks please) and Group B remained. Of the 39 Group C cars at Le Mans, 11 were 956s. Pick a winner.

Best bet, the Rothmans works cars with the new Bosch Motronic system. The customer cars had to make do with 1982-spec bits and fits. The absolute sure bet, said practically all assembled, was the Jacky Ickx/Derek Bell No. 1 Porsche 956. The pair was going for the hat trick, and no one was betting against the Belgian and the Briton.

Ickx and Bell had had little amusement winning their second straight Le Mans a year before in a tactical – but somewhat processional – race. Porsche relieved Ickx’s boredom on Wednesday by fitting his 956 with a set of Dunlop gumballs, the big mega-lag/mega-power KKK turbocharger and pointed him at qualifying. The eye-watering result was a 155.07mph lap, or 3:16.56 for the 8.467mi. There were no qualifying gummies or doomsday turbos for either Hurley Haywood, Vern Schuppan and Al Holbert or Jochen Mass and Stefan Bellof.

The Le Mans pole is somewhat more important than anyone admits. While 24 hours seems to make qualifying almost irrelevant, there is real gold in a pole position. True, Ickx himself has twice won from last place. But that highly charged first lap is in clear-channel focus for millions of spectators: in person, on television and even radio. The visual impact of leading the first lap at Le Mans has more commercial traction than all the victory salutes of the dozen F1 races that follow Monaco. Porsche knows it; Jacky Ickx knows it and behaved accordingly. Rothmans tobacco was especially appreciative.

Lap two didn’t go so well. Jan Lammers made a rookie’s mistake and left his braking in Richard Lloyd’s 956 a bit late. Ickx was turning into Mulsanne when Lammers arrived. Sideways. There was contact, and Ickx got to watch Lammers continue along the RN 158, backwards. The pit stop to assess and repair cost the five-time Le Mans-winner 10min. Within the golden hour when TV viewership is highest, the best and most dramatic story seemed pre-scripted: time again for another signature Jacky Ickx dash through the 55-car field.

It was a better story than the proposed Porsche vs. Lancia battle. That story line was a four-alarm flop in '82, and when Jean-Claude Andruet pitted early to have the on-board television camera in his Lancia tweaked. It was the best and least complicated moment of the weekend for Lancia.

Up front and away from such cares, Haywood, Holbert and Schuppan led with speed and cool Motronic economy. The Andrettis, teamed with Phillipe Alliot, had to do the fuel consumption sums for their Kremer 956 on paper but got up to a tantalizing second before being visited by reality. Their pace had simply used too much fuel. The Andrettis were racers, and the notion of pedaling around on an economy run offended their core sensibilities. But, they went into cruise mode anyway.

The Rothmans Porsches had no such troubles. Their problems came from a different quarter: at 1:00 a.m. the Mass/Bellof car pitted with an elusive misfire. New plugs didn’t cure it. Finally herr engineer Falk ordered two cylinders disconnected!

By midnight, Porsches 956s filled the top 10, problems or not. An oil leak in the No. 1 Porsche appeared to be the final nail, and the Ickx/Bell hat trick seemed derailed for sure. But just before 4:00 a.m., Ickx and Bell eased onto the lead lap with Haywood, Schuppan and Holbert’s 956. It was not the sort of fraught pursuit that brought the crowd to its feet, but it was a fine adult performance. During the normal sequence of carefully planned pit stops the No. 1 car actually led, briefly.

The Rothmans’ intramural broke out in earnest at dawn. The Ickx/Bell car chased and passed the No. 3 at sufficient pace to draw away from the well-placed but frustrated Andrettis/Alliot Kremer 956, riding in a solid and economical third place. Then Bell was stranded on Mulsanne with a different version of the ignition problems that had stranded the Mass/Bellof 956. He changed the metering unit and made it home. But the whole episode cost him six laps and seemed to erase any opportunity of a chase. The Andrettis moved up to second as Haywood, Schuppan and Holbert continued serenely.

The Mass/Bellof works 956 disappeared for good on Sunday morning. The strain of running sick and lame on four cylinders had been too much for the wounded engine.

Haywood, Schuppan and Holbert were leading. They had two laps in hand from alleged teammates Ickx and Bell when the offside door blew off the No. 3. This is bad for two important reasons. The greater of these is that the ducting for the radiators is molded into the horizontal contours of the door just below the window. It also annoys the driver. Who, at the time, was Schuppan. But there were still nine 956s in the top 10.

At 2:55 p.m., with one hour and five minutes remaining, Schuppan took the leading 956 to the pits a bit early. Holbert replaced Schuppan: Al was slated to finish the car anyway, and they stuck to their plan. The mechanics fitted a new door, and Holbert rejoined the race. Haywood, trained in the strict, regimented and fruitful Brumos-method of endurance racing by the late Peter Gregg, stood ready in the pits near his helmet and gloves. Schuppan made no moves to change into his civvies either.

Holbert – to his astonishment – found the left bank cylinder temperature practically pegged. But a run down Mulsanne soothed the temperature gauge, and Holbert exhaled. That’s when the new door broke away. He grabbed for it instinctively and held it shut. A quick glance at the left-bank cylinder-head temperature gauge was even more alarming. Through the Porsche Curves the needle started to rise again. He could actually see it moving! Ickx had already gone by. With 49min remaining, Ickx handed over to Bell. As planned. The No. 1 car was now just one lap behind.

But the Ickx/Bell car was handicapped as well. The front rotors were cracked, and Bell could not apply full force to his wounded teammate’s predicament. Once out of the pits and onto Mulsanne, the front end of the No. 1 Porsche pounded the steering wheel. Bell had to hang on to the throbbing controls and race practically without brakes. He was still able to trim 10 to 15sec a lap from Holbert’s gauzy lead.

With 35min to go, Holbert’s radio crackled to life: it was team manager Roland Kussmaul. Time for fuel. At least the mechanics could fix the door. This time they used a stout leather strap. Then Bell swept past and joined Holbert on the lead lap. Bell had always dreamed about winning Le Mans on the final lap, and Holbert’s one-handed lap times were about 20sec off normal race pace.

The temperature gauges would not cooperate, as Holbert began what he thought would be his last lap. Then he smelled coolant. Not faintly. It was a pungent odor, and he knew all the water was gone. Somehow the No. 3 Porsche made it all the way around to the Ford Chicane. Haywood watched mesmerized as Holbert came into view.

A huge white cloud of smoke billowed out of the exhaust. The engine had seized. Holbert acted instinctively, slammed the gear lever in first and put his foot on the throttle. The shock snapped the seized engine loose. He looked up the road to the starter’s stand: no checkered flag. One more chugging, dying lap with Bell closing. Unknown to Holbert, the fuel warning light had just winked on in the No. 1 car.

Le Mans tradition as much as his own quick thinking saved Holbert’s inspired victory. As he crawled around the final 8.4mi lap, marshals and flagmen and corner workers emerged waving flags and walking on the track. Bell would see them soon enough. He was never able to close with Holbert, who stopped the dying car the moment it crossed the finish line. Al looked through the smoke and saw the mob coming. He bailed out and ran for it. Haywood and Schuppan were already on the podium, still in uniform.