VW Dominate Le Mans

VW is a great marque and Le Mans is a great race but they are not names that are normally associated with each other. Despite this though Ferdinand Piech, the head of the VW group was one of only two people to receive the 2001 Spirit of Le Mans' award. This is the first year that the award has been given and it is reserved for those people who the races organisers, the ACO (l'Automobile Club de l'Ouest) feel best represent the spirit of the race. Le Mans is a race that typically conjures up images of great racing marques such as Ferrari and Jaguar and on the face of it the giving the award to the head of VW seems a little strange but in many ways it makes sense.

1970 Le Mans winning Porsche 917K

Whilst Ferdinand Piech now heads up the VW group he is first and foremost a great engineer, in fact many rate him as one of the greatest automobile engineers of the century and this comes as no surprise when you consider that he is the grandson of Ferdinand Porsche. Though having had involvement in several other key projects Piech's first major achievement came in 1970 when the Porsche 917 won Le Mans. He had been responsible for the project which turned racing on its head. In 1970 and 1971 the 917 dominated the world sports car series and won Le Mans both years, what is more it could probably have done so for a few more years had it not been outlawed by rule changes. The 917 not only changed the course of racing in general being so far ahead of everything else in it's day in every sense but it also set a new course for Porsche who have gone on to become the most successful manufacturer at Le Mans ever. To date they have won 16 times equalling the second and third most successful manufacturers put together, (Ferrari with 9 wins and Jaguar with 7 wins). In fact Porsche won 7 victories in succession between 1981 and 87 equalling Jaguars total in one run. They might have had one more victory in 1990 had the leading Joest run Porsche not retired in the last 15 minutes of the race after an epic battle with Jaguar.

Following his success at Porsche Piech moved to Audi and subsequently VW. With VW Piech has done much the same for the company in business terms as he did with Porsche in racing terms. Though a sturdy company with a good product range VW in manufacturer terms was an also ran to the likes of Ford and GM. Under Piech though it has become one of the most feared manufacturers of the day stealing market share from rivals not only in it's traditional sector of the market but also in the prestige sector taking on the likes of BMW and Mercedes. Piech has done this not only by bolstering and improving the VW and Audi ranges but also by taking over and realising the potential of manufacturers like Seat and Skoda. As an aside to the general market Piech has also been experimenting with specialist parts of the market. Acquisitions of Marques such as Bentley and Bugatti showed that there were some pretty big ideas being hatched in the board room and the concept W12 super car was evidence that Piech was not yet bored of the performance side of things either. Following it's unveiling it prompted talk of a possible VW entry at Le Mans but subsequently it was the Audi name that appeared there.

2001 Audi R8

In 1999 four Audi's were entered in the race, two open cars (R8R's) and two closed cars (R8C's). As a new car success was not expected and technical problems saw the two R8C versions retire but the R8R's quietly went on to place 3rd and 4th so they were the favourites for 2000 when 3 heavily revised versions of the R8R, now designated R8's were entered. The Audi's went on to shatter their opponents and subsequently finished with an historic 1-2-3. For Audi and the VW group as a whole it was a resounding success and bought with it echoes of Piech's past but 2001 was to be even better.

As well as being awarded "The Spirit of Le Mans' Piech was also given the honour of starting the race but he will probably be most proud of what happened on the track over the course of the subsequent 24hr's. The two works entered Joest Audis and the two privately entered Gulf and Champion Audis were favourites and true to form the Joest cars finished with a 1-2 repeating the success of the 2000 race. Sadly the tough conditions of the wet race saw the two private Audi's retiring early. For Piech and the VW group though the 1-2 was not the end of the success story.

2001 ROC VW

In 2000 a new secondary prototype class was introduced, (LMP675) and amongst the entries in the new class was a French team, ROC who ran a car with a Reynard chassis and an unfancied VW engine. The car showed some promise but retired overnight with electrical problems but the team learnt some lessons and this year came back to have another go. The 1997cc VW engine was the smallest in the race and other LMP675 teams seemed a much better bet for success. Indeed amongst them was Dick Barbour Racing who carry a lot of experience and who also used the Reynard chassis for both their cars but were using a Judd 3397cc power plant and as such seemed more likely to finish ahead of the single ROC car. A steady pace and the fact that unlike many it lasted the distance meant that the ROC VW not only won it's class eventually finishing 39 laps (332 miles) and some 14 places ahead of the second car in the class (WR Peugeot) but it also finished 5th overall which is quite an achievement when you consider the strength of many of this years 48 entries.

Bentley EXP Speed 8

When VW acquired Bentley a return to Le Mans was always going to be on the cards and 2001 saw the Bentley colours flying in France once again. Though many of Bentley's cars have historically been named after parts of the La Sarthe circuit, (Mulsanne, Arnage, Hunaudieres etc) the marque has not officially entered the event for 71 years so their presence attracted quite a lot of interest. The car, the EXP Speed 8 was seen as having great potential but in terms of pace was not quite up there with the Audi's and there were some doubts about it's reliability being a new car with limited testing and no race experience. The car is powered by an adapted version of the V8 engine that powers the Audis but the car itself is very different and is unique in that it was the only car in the premiere LMP900 class to feature closed bodywork. It's design is partly derived from the lessons learnt with the 1999 Audi R8C's but it is an entirely new car and is very much a Bentley supported by the VW parent organisation as opposed to it being an Audi or VW with a Bentley badge. During the race one of the Bentley's managed to lead for a number of laps but then dropped down the order eventually retiring however the second Bentley, like the ROC was steady and earned itself a place on the podium in third behind the two Audi's.

Collectively this meant that by the end of the race the VW group of companies effectively had four out of the five top places in the race. For Piech himself it was even better than that, being one of the family he still holds a stake in Porsche and they dominated the LMGT class. Of the top 12 finishers there were only two cars that Piech had no personal interests or involvement in, the Chrysler Mopar in 4th and the Corvette C5R in 8th. The rest of the places all the way down to 12th were made up by 911 GT3RS. Mat Sanchez

The 1st and 2nd Audis, the Bentley in 3rd and the VW powered ROC in 5th all crossed the finish together

The Best of Le Mans on the Web

Anyone wishing to go to Le Mans or just find out more about the race will find loads of useful information on the web, the following sites between them should provide you with everything you need to know.

Independent site with loads of great information on both the history of the race and the latest news.

The 1st and 2nd Audis, the Bentley in 3rd and the VW powered ROC in 5th all crossed the finish together

http://www.maisonblanche.co.uk/

Independent site featuring lots of general information, includes a forum, travel guides and a travel service:

http://www.club-arnage.com/

The official Le Mans site:

http://www.lemans.org/

The official site of the race organisers, the ACO:

http://www.lemans-aco.com/

Homepage for Radio Le Mans, live webcasts from Le Mans in English, if you go there you can tune in on 91.2FM:

http://www.radiolemans.com/

Mathew Sanchez