User:Nicky105/History of Le Mans

I've been doing Gran Turismo for a long long time, and I thought I would come here and share a little history of Le Mans ans Then Nurburgring which will be in a different story, this is the history.

May 26th and 27th, 1923 saw the first running of the Le Mans 24 hours, on the public roads around Le Mans town, the original idea was for a three year event, with the winner being the. At that could go the furthest distance over 3 consecutive races,this plan was abandoned in 1928 and the Le Mans 24 hours winners were declared for each year depending on who covered the furthest distance in 24 hours, the early races were dominated by British,French and Italian drivers,teams and cars, with Bently, Alfa Romeo and Bugatti being the prominent Marques.

By the 1930s innovations in car design began appearing at the Le Mans 24 hour circuit, with Bugatti and Alfa Romeo running aerodynamic bodywork, enabling them to reach faster speeds down the Mulsanne straight. In 1936 the race had to be canceled due to strikes in France. With the outbreak in World War II in late 1939, the Le Mans 24 hours race went on a ten year break.

1982-1993

Porche dominated the 1980s Le Mans with the new group C car formula that punched the boundaries of fuel effiency. The Porche 956 was the pioneer of the field, it was later replaced by the successful 962. Both of these chassis were relatively cheap and privateers were able to purchase them enmasse. This led to a Porsche chassis winning 6 years in a row, the 1980s saw Jaguar and Mercedes Benz make a return to sports car racing, while an influx of Japenese manufacturers saw prototypes from Nissan and Toyota at Le Mans 24 hours. However, it was Mazdas unique rotary-powered 787B that would be the only car to succeed.

2000-2010

The increasing costs associated with running a car in the Le Mans 24 hour saw major automobile manufacturers review their participation in the early 21st century, among these manufacturers, only Audi would remain competing at the Le Mans 24 hours, easily dominating the races with their R8.

Although MG, Panoz, and Chrysler, all briefly made attempts to compete with Audi, none could match the performance of the Audi R8, after 3 consecutive victories, Audi provided engine, support staff, and drivers to their corporate partner Bently,who had returned in 2001, these factory Bentlys were finally able to succeeded at Le Mans 24 hours ahead of the new privateer Audis in 2003.