1992 Le Mans

1992 — If there were a formal, carefully detailed and conceived plan to depose the posture and position of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, it is hard to imagine that it could have worked any better than the new 3.5-liter World Sports Car Championship rules. There was further help from a recession and the uncertainty of a world that had – six months earlier – watched a superpower collapse like a soap bubble. The pattern of international politics had been broken, the Cold War had simply ceased to exist and – perhaps the most disturbing element in all this raucous change – a rotary-engined Japanese car from little Mazda was the reigning Le Mans champion.

Uncertain times indeed. For those looking for comfort in routine or familiar patterns, it was maddening – unless that pattern concerned the forced obsolescence of the venerable Porsche 962.

New FIA rules slashed available fuel to 2140 liters, down 400 (110 US gallons) from 1991. The ’92 race was the 10th anniversary of the seminal 956, a watershed prototype and a first-time-out Le Mans winner. Five showed up anyway (though not one any longer had a Porsche chassis) sympathetic to the presumption that the Category One Peugeots, Toyotas, Oreca Mazda MXR-01s (V-10s with XJR-14-ish chassis out of TWR, no less), Judd-powered Lolas, and their F1-ish ilk wouldn’t last.

From a 50-car entry list, 28 genuine starters emerged. It was the lowest car count at Le Mans since '32 when Raymond Sommer and Luigi Chinetti won for Alfa Romeo, and smaller even than the field for the inaugural '23 24 Hours. The thin entry included four makeweight 2.0-liter Peugeot 905 center-seat spyders from the French national series.

Jean Sage brought six Peugeot 905s: three racers and one T-car for each driver set. Tom’s Toyota saw its chance but brought only one V10 T-car for its three-car team. Peugeots gridded first, second and sixth with Toyotas third, fourth and fifth. Full marks to Peugeot’s Yannick Dalmas for lapping the new 8.45mi course five seconds faster than Mark Blundell’s '91 pole-winning lap.

Even Mother Nature seemed to disapprove of this small field and covered the first three hours of the race with a penetrating rain. Hero of the early going was Mazda’s '91 winner Volker Weidler, who intruded upon the Toyotas, then bounced the leading Peugeots of Philippe Alliot and Dalmas who were running to Jean Sage’s orders: no intramural racing! Another wake-up call from the tough little Mazda team.

Toyota and Peugeot were both wounded at 5:30, when Geoff Lees in the No. 7 Toyota was temporarily blinded by spray as he entered the Mulsanne straight. He eased off the throttle. It was instinct, but he was struck by Alain Ferte’s 905B. Both cars made the long crawl to the pits, but their strategic effectiveness was spent, as both were under the knife for nearly an hour.

Weidler turned the leading Mazda over to Johnny Herbert, and when Dalmas swapped with Derek Warwick the lead passed to Peugeot with Jean-Pierre Jabouille’s 905B third, then a pair of Toyotas (one a 92CV from Team Sard).

The rain muted speed, pace and passions until dinner time and gave the fragile V10s a light breather. It soothed fuel consumption worries for the turbo teams and generally insulated all hands from the problems that lurk above 9/10ths pace. Michelin (Peugeot) was better provisioned for these sloppy conditions (they had two rain compounds) than one-compound Goodyear (Mazda).

The No. 1 Blundell/Dalmas/Warwick Peugeot took the lead for good during the second hour. The Toyotas increased their pace after 8:00 o’clock when the rain finally stopped and began their hunt to displace the Herbert Mazda as the Peugeot’s chief tormentor. But the rain returned at the beginning of the fifth hour and stayed with concomitant benefit and penalty. The Alliot/Mauro Baldi/Jabouille No. 2 Peugeot 905 went after the surprising Mazda and moved the Toyotas down a notch.

Sunday’s dawn was dry and full light. Near 6:00 a.m. Alliot got a mild scare when his power steering pump quit and put him into the gravel at L’Arche. The interlude cost him 15min, nine of them in the pits; and upon his return to the course, he smacked the tire wall at Arnage. That cost five more minutes, as the whole engine cover had to be replaced. It allowed the Herbert/Weidler/Bertrand Gachot/Maurizio Sala Mazda through into second place again. Not a good place to be as it turned out – Gachot immediately pitted with a confused gear shift linkage. It took nine minutes to repair; just enough time to readmit the No. 2 Peugeot and the Kenny Acheson/Pierre-Henri Raphanel/Masanori Sekiya Tom’s Toyota TS010 to the podium positions.

A wave of adrenaline swept through the Peugeot pits just before 9:00 o’clock: Warwick began to complain of a sudden and profound ignition problem. Jean Todt remained composed and brought the leading 905 in for routine brake service, plus a little electronic diagnostic work. The ignition cut out several times on his in-lap, and Warwick was haunted by the fear of not making it to the pits. The lead they had worked so hard to build all night was now about to drain away for long, complicated electrical repairs. The worry was for nothing. The No. 1 Peugeot was in the pits just 10min for an electrical system transplant and never lost the lead.

No such luck for the No. 2 905. Ferte handed over to Baldi while the crew replaced a universal joint in the steering gear. It took 11min. An hour later, Baldi spun onto the beach at Indianapolis: the No. 33 Toyota of Acheson/Raphanel/Sekiya went by, eventually putting four laps on the low downforce No. 2 Peugeot. The best Mazda was still suffering gear change problems, but it was a stone through the radiator that finally allowed the Toyota into second place.

Baldi & Company got back three of those heartbreaking four laps by the end, missing a Peugeot one-two finish by a lap. The Cougar (nee’ Cougar, re-nee’ Courage and the hell with Lincoln-Mercury Division’s lawyers!) was a lap down to the Trust Engineering Toyota 92CV in the turbo class. The 3.5-liter Category One cars were a surprising first through fifth overall on merit. Peugeot was the first French car to win the 24 Hours since,

A) '80 when the Cosworth-powered Rondeau won, or… if one wishes to resort to jingoistic pedantry…

B) '78 when Renault won and even the drivers and tires were French.

The Brits had something genuine to cheer about because…

A) The experts were wrong again: all the 3.5-liter F1 cars with fenders didn’t break and two British drivers helped Yannik Dalmas hoist Jean Todt above their heads on the podium, or…

B) Le Mans, a British race conveniently held in France, wasn’t a travesty, despite the low car count, or…

C) It rained so much no one got homesick.

Peugeot finished out the year as the final FIA Sports Car Champion. The series was abandoned, and the question on nearly everyone’s mind was, "Now what?"