1995 Le Mans

1995 — Like Indianapolis, the Sarthe circuit traces its considerable pedigree to the first days of the practical automobile. As early as 1873, Amedee Bollee built practical steam-powered omnibuses in the little village of Le Mans. While the Indy 500 was organized to promote the automobile, the 24 Hours of Le Mans was created to prove and improve the automobile beyond the criticisms of the day; to illustrate that long distance automobile touring was not only possible but practical and even entertaining. From Le Mans we inherit the concepts of long range touring, decent handling, potent and reliable brakes, good lighting and practical weather protection, broad utility plus the concept of homologation – a kind of social reassurance for the automotive masses that all this is not a toy for the rich.

New rules for 1995 slammed shut the loophole that was big enough to drive through to victory in '94. Still, it was done without plugging the interstice through which long shots and dark horses will occasionally ease with wondrous grace and speed.

Le Mans was buzzed about the return of Ferrari. The new 333SP World Sports Car had made a blazing debut in the American IMSA sprint series. Antonio Ferrari’s (no relation beyond customer) USA-based Euromotorsport provided a lone Category One 333SP for seven-time F1 winner Rene Arnoux plus Massimo Sigala and Jay Cochran. The much-feted roadster appeared with an IMSA-legal rev limiter. This did not satisfy the A.C.O. rules, and after several entertaining arguments and much gesticulation the Ferrari gridded 17th, five rows behind all three F40 GT-1 Ferraris and well off the pace of the local favorite Courage-Porsches.

Yves Courage saw his chance with Bob Wollek, Mario Andretti and former winner Eric Helary in his ominously designated No. 13 gridded inside row two behind the amazing single seat WR-Peugeots. The little center-seaters had gone from spear-carriers to pole winners in four years. Beyond his ambitions to win the pole WR patron and entrant Gerard Welter – of high velocity specialist WM fame – had few ambitions or delusions about a full 24-hour run. It was a bizarre but realistic attitude. His first car left the field via an accident on the 34th lap. But full credit to the pole winner, who went into Sunday morning before the inevitable arrived.

The GT-1 class was the most populous segment of the grid, and the new GT Ferraris were the fastest of the lot. All three F40s were faster than the new center-seat McLaren F1 V12 coupes on recess from the BPR championship. The British three-seaters with German V12 engines spent every moment of track time focused on race set-up not qualifying speeds.

The best of breed gridded a respectable ninth, barely edging Jean-Marc Gounon’s GT-1 Venturi 600 LM. The McLarens had not yet raced any distance beyond the BPR-mandated four-hour limit. While technically interesting – as any car from the mind of Gordon Murray is and shall always be – his McLaren’s were not the first mentioned by the best and brightest of Le Mans’ legion of eager pro-prognosticators. Nor were two well-crewed Honda NSX GT1 entries.

The glow over the Ferrari 333SP wore off and everyone finally managed to calm down about Mario Andretti and the return of recently retired – just kidding! – Derek Bell, who could not pass up an opportunity to race with son Justin. The Bells were joined in the Harrods-sponsored Mach One Racing McLaren by Andy Wallace. It was time for a hard look at the field and who would drive with whom and what about the weather and other such pivotal things that made weak headlines but upon which the race usually turns. The Kremer K8 with Hans Stuck and Thierry Boutsen was considered quite a fine bet. Especially if it rained. Which it did.

The tender two-liter turbo WRs led from the pole; but when their expected fragility surfaced, the WSC cars were there. When the WSC guns pitted, the McLarens went ahead. The three-seaters were the last to pit, which is a fine strategic advantage at Le Mans. The West Competition (David Price) McLaren (Jochen Mass, Thomas Bscher and John Nielsen) was leading when the rains came. And stayed.

It was all beginning to look a bit like the deluge of '58. The field spent 45min behind the safety car when pole-winner Patrick Gonin went aquaplaning off the Mulsanne straight and flipped in the little WR. The poor thing came down wrong side up. It took 30min to remove Gonin, hanging bruised and battered from his belts. The first car behind the safety car was Wallace in the unmistakable No. 51 Harrods (YELLOW!) McLaren. A sticking throttle cable in the Harrods F1 put the No. 49 West McLaren in front again. Wallace pitted the Mach One-entered McLaren for routine service and some attention to the throttle problem. He was relieved by father Bell who recovered one of the two lost laps.

By now the much heralded American-based Euromotorsport Ferrari 333SP was in the dead car park, much to the relief of the Ferrari factory who had seen its cars humiliated at Daytona and wanted no part of a 333SP Le Mans program. Relief.

Nielsen drove a four-hour shift in the No. 49 McLaren and passed the helm to Jochen Mass with a reasonable lead over the Andretti/Wollek/Helary Courage-Porsche. The third-place Gulf McLaren went to Philippe Alliot after Pierre-Henri Raphanel also pulled a triple stint. The story was much the same down the McLaren plan of battle. Wallace had also triple-stinted in fourth overall before handing off to D. Bell. Maybe these were grand touring cars after all.

Ray Bellm’s McLaren took him for a big ride that ended with damage that looked fatal to the Gulf effort. But Bellm got the No. 24 back to the pits for some protracted tape-and-rivet bodywork, and Maurizio Sandro Sala took the Gulf McLaren back into the fight – ugly but still plenty fast.

Bigger problems struck the biggest names in the field. Andretti had relieved Wollek in the No. 13 Courage-Porsche. Whistling through the somewhat technical Porsche Curves, Andretti tripped over the Antonio Hermann Kremer K8. He had assumed the No. 4 roadster was being driven by that legendary master of moisture, Hans Stuck. Andretti planned his approach accordingly. But Hermann was on the brakes somewhat earlier than either Stuck or Andretti would have preferred, and the astonished Mario chose a point on the Armco instead of the tail of "Stuck’s" K8. It wasn’t an especially hard impact: the wing and some suspension bits suffered most. A fuming Andretti was able to return the No. 13 to the pits, but the fix took six agonizing laps, which would haunt Andretti and Wollek on Sunday afternoon.

The rain continued and strengthened through the evening. By midnight, the best of the WSC prototypes were sixth through eighth behind a pentad of McLarens led by the Team West’s Bscher/Mass/Nielsen who were a lap clear of the Bells –pere et fils – and Andy Wallace, who was running without a windshield wiper! The seminal "works" No. 59 McLaren (#001) of Yannick Dalmas, JJ Lehto and Masanori Sekiya was third on the same lap with the Harrods McLaren.

There was further evidence of a road car renaissance at Le Mans at midnight. Reeves Callaway’s Corvette was leading GT2 from another Callaway Corvette, this one from Rocky Agusta’s stable.

But all anyone remembers about that soaking night at Le Mans was JJ Lehto in "001". Nielsen’s leading West McLaren lost its clutch just after the halfway hour and the Wallace/Bells Harrods McLaren moved ahead. At 3:00 a.m., Lehto went aboard the No. 59 McLaren. He was tuned to a different frequency that night. People who should have been asleep, or at least indoors, stood in the rain and slop to watch Lehto weave his web.

JJ pulled a double stint in perhaps the worst conditions of the meeting and went into the lead during the perilous morning hours of transition. It was heroic stuff. He was slicing huge 10-second chunks of time away from the Bells & Wallace. People still talk about it with awe – drunk or sober – when the subject is Le Mans.

But the rain retreated after dawn, and the Andretti Courage was coming. Derek Bell wanted to win and tie Jacky Ickx with six Le Mans victories. Andretti wanted to fill the only vacant line on his juicy CV. Wollek had his own score to settle with the Sarthe. The men from Courage were coming, and Helary eventually took the car onto the same lap with the leading No. 59 McLaren

Dalmas had relieved the heroic Lehto but was having his own troubles. He was on full wets, and the track was drying. He was opposite Andy Wallace (never enviable) who ran him down on dry tires, while Dalmas tried to get to the end of his stint without upsetting the pit stop sequence.

Ultimately Andy Wallace padded his lead to a whole lap, then watched it slip away during a routine brake service. When Papa Bell got back in the No. 51, he was on the same lap as Lehto. Lunchtime was approaching. So was the Andretti Courage. Mario had reveled in the long pursuit, taking 20 to 25sec each lap from the McLarens. There was no longer any need for a cerebral game plan: just run as hard and fast as possible. No restrictions; no limits. It was the sort of thing Andretti craved: the berserker warrior’s sprint car ethic spread over 16 glorious hours.

The rot set in slowly in the leading No. 51 Harrods McLaren. At first Bell had problems and delays finding the appropriate gears. He and Lehto were running fast, but hardly at the absolute limit. It got increasingly frustrating; each change required more care. Eventually Bell got first gear in one of the Mulsanne chicanes, and the yellow McLaren went all the way around. Then he couldn’t get any gear at all and fumbled around the box hoping for anything that might move the filthy yellow car forward. He ended up with sixth gear and had to watch the Courage go past into second place. The whole episode consumed five minutes. Their race for the lead was over, but a podium was still in the cards.

The leading No. 59 McLaren had escaped, pursued by Andretti and then a fit and fresh Helary. They had fought back manfully and emerged just barely on the lead lap. Their one hope was to make the final stop fuel-only, but the tires would not tolerate another tank at the speeds they wanted, needed to run. New rubber brought them home a safe second, one lap down. Wollek and Andretti were denied Le Mans again.

Dalmas drove the final stint in "001" and won his third Le Mans victory in just five starts. Not on a par with Woolf Barnato’s three-for-three record but practically miraculous in the Nineties.

The McLaren F1 joined inaugural Le Mans victor Chenard-Walcker and ’49 winner Ferrari as a 24 Hour winner in their first attempt. The best Ferrari was the 12th place F40.

Bell joined his son and Wallace on the podium, long familiar territory. Wollek was there too, with Andretti and Helary who had been there before and stood on the high step.

The hero was JJ Lehto. His teammate Masanori Sekiya became the first Japanese driver to win Le Mans and thereby an instant hero to all Nippon. Their win was also the first for a BMW engine and the first for a V12 in five years. It was a fine, if wet, day of firsts all around.