Le Mans Classic Legend: 'more modern, more funky' celebration makes its debut in 2026

This summer the Le Mans Classic enters a new era. Several new eras, in fact, as one of the world’s biggest and most celebrated historic racing events breaks new ground with an expansion the likes of which we’ve never seen.

The biggest issue with creating a living, breathing dedication to the history of the Le Mans 24 Hours is actually doing it justice in a single event. Pre-dated by only the Indy 500 in terms of continuous circuit races, Le Mans boasts over 100 years of history and continues to write new chapters with every passing season. From pre-war brutes to evocative 1950/60s GTs, the primitive prototypes of the 1970s to turbocharged monsters and flame-spitting Group C cars, through GT1 specials and into the cutting edge aerodynamic and alternatively-fuelled LMP1 era… no other race has featured the sort of technical and performance evolutions the Le Mans 24 Hours has.

That’s why something new was needed to both break the Le Mans Classic mould, but also not smash it beyond recognition.

Le Mans Classic Legend tickets: on sale now

What you’ll see at the Circuit de la Sarthe this summer, between July 2-5, will still intrinsically be the Le Mans Classic, but expanded and modernised. Enter the Le Mans Classic Legend, a new dedication celebrating the eras, cars and drivers spanning from the 1970s to the mid-2010s. The Le Mans Classic of old was established in 2002 to celebrate the earliest years of the race from the 1920s up to the 1970s. But that format left a good half-a-century virtually untouched, which event organisers Peter Auto and the Automobile Club de l’Ouest knew all too well. With the Classic now firmly established and drawing in almost 250,000 spectators, the time was right to switch up the concept.

First step, create an all-new event, one that can cater to both new and existing audiences, while not devaluing the exclusivity that the Le Mans Classic enjoys. The Le Mans Classic will now be held annually, instead of biennially, but will be spread across two separate events. The original format remains, now called Le Mans Classic Heritage, showcasing those early decades in all their oil-stained and brutal glory. This will return in 2027, but for now the stage is set for the new Legend spin-off, which does the opposite, majoring on speed, technical innovation and giving a home to automotive exotica which simply didn’t have one after their competitive lifecycles had ended.

“The idea was not to reproduce the same event every year because we wanted to keep the exclusivity that we have with the Le Mans Classic,” says Peter Auto’s managing director, Marc Ouayoun. “We knew there was potential to do a lot more. The event is denser every year with more grids and more cars and more car clubs, and it gets too much for a single event. When we started we only ran cars up to the 1970s, and now we are adding an extra 50 years with Legend. Motor sport continues to write its history so we have had to adapt also to showcase more of it.”

“More and more cars are becoming attractive to younger generations”

For anybody unfamiliar with the Le Mans Classic, it’s an innovative event with an interesting race format. Held on the full 13km (8 mile) Circuit de la Sarthe, it is spread across a single weekend, with different eras of cars segregated into numbered grids according to their time periods. Grid 1 for vintage and pre-war 1923-1939, Grid 2 for early sports models 1949-1956, Grid 3 for classics 1957-1961, etc. Groups are determined often by the changes in regulation across the history of the race, with cut-off points coinciding with when engine capacity or chassis rules were adjusted. This ensures all cars race against period-correct opposition. The groups race on a sort of roll-on-roll-off format, so the track is active almost continuously throughout the 24 hours, with each grid enjoying contests in both the daylight and night.

The first five grids compete in the Heritage event. This year, organisers will celebrate a whole new segment of history with the addition of five new more contemporary Legend grids.

Overwhelming demand to expand Le Mans Classic

“More and more cars are becoming attractive to younger generations, and we were not able to pack more Le Mans Classic content into one event,” explains Ouayoun. “We already had six grids with more than 80 cars entered in each, and even though we are privileged to use the full La Sarthe track there was frustration at times because we had long waiting lists and many owners asking if they could drive more recent cars.

“The Le Mans Classic Legend is more modern, more ‘funky’”

“The Le Mans Classic now attracts 238,000 visitors, has over 700 cars and 1200 drivers, 8500 car club members. We decided creating two different events to be rotated was the best way to expand, making the Le Mans Classic annual, but with each event still enjoying a space and feel of its own.

“Heritage is very similar to the Classic we all know, with grids from the beginning of the 24 Hours up to the 1970s. We decided to keep the good quality of the show by reducing the grids from six to five, which gives things a bit of a buffer in case of yellow flags or accidents to be on the safe side. The vintage event is a tribute to the roots of the race, the start of endurance and of those fantastic emotional GT cars and then the arrival of the first prototypes. This was an amazing period for Le Mans that shaped the race we have today, it’s a tribute to the history of racing and the gentleman drivers who drove it.

“The new format for this year is completely different. Le Mans Classic Legend is the last 50 years, with Heritage being the first 50. Each will have a different feel, different show, different atmosphere, but under the same Le Mans Classic banner. The Le Mans Classic Legend is more modern, more ‘funky’. The animations, the show around the track will be different because there are so many things to say about these wonderful years of the ’80s, ’90s and others that speak to so many generations of cars fans and enthusiasts.”

It won’t be the first time that more modern machines have competed at the Le Mans Classic: last year featured a Group C support race, plus Peter Auto’s Endurance Racing Legends series for GTs and prototypes from the 1990s-2000s. However, they did not compete at night or during the golden hours of sunset or dawn, and neither did the drivers enjoy the longer track time that comes with a main show slot.

“Group C is a great example,” adds Ouayoun. “There is always a lot of demand for those cars, so it’s a great addition because to many generations that was the golden era of Le Mans. Now with the new format we can integrate Group C as a main grid, with even a night race for them and the conditions will be very different and I know the owners of these cars are very excited to have more feature and more driving time on the full Le Mans Circuit, which is very special.”

The magic of the full Circuit de la Sarthe

The fact Peter Auto and the ACO have managed to secure the necessary closures for the full Circuit de la Sarthe twice across a year is a coup. With public roads forming the most iconic parts of the track, it takes a monumental logistical effort to add that layer of originality to the event.

“It’s a legendary track and there is huge work that goes in to ensure we can open the full circuit again for the Classic, so that work has doubled with this new format,” explains Ouayoun. “We could just run on the Bugatti Circuit, but that’s not Le Mans as it should be. That would be very disappointing. The magic of the event is the full circuit. We can only close the roads Friday-Sunday, not for the whole week like the main 24 Hours can.”

The question of authenticity also extends to the entries, however with this newer Legend format spectators can be assured that almost every car they see on track is the real deal. In a world where the most exotic classics now boast values that make them almost unraceable, replicas or continuation cars are often used to give a flavour without bankrupting owners and insurers of Ferrari 250s and Jaguar Cs and Ds. However, with the Legend grids this is far less of an issue, simply because such copies or evocations don’t exist.

“Any car entered needs to have a connection with Le Mans, a model that was either selected or homologated for the race, or one that actually competed in period,” says Ouayoun. “All the grids from Group C upwards will be original cars, not continuations or replicas simply because there aren’t any. Nobody makes a continuation of a 2010 LMP1 or LMP2 car, so they are all original cars in their original Le Mans specification. Cars from the 1970s downwards are more relevant for continuations, and if we have some of those we will look at the technical conformity to the period as key to acceptance.

“We need to have cars that are totally compliant with what they were in period. Of course there can be some exceptions, such as we are happy to use LED headlight bulbs at night for safety, but we want period-correct engines and brakes and we have a very good scrutineering team working to ensure things are as correct as they can be.”

“Cars like the very first Audi R18 can run with the hybrid element suppressed”

Perhaps the most intriguing of the new grids is the latest, Grid 10, which gives a home to LMP1 (2006-2012) as well as LMP2 and GTE cars up to 2015.

“Grid 10 will be the newest and also one of the most exciting,” enthuses Ouayoun. “These cars belong to the new Legends of Le Mans series [another Peter Auto standalone creation] and will also be racing at FIA World Endurance Championship events this year. We have 35 owners on this special grid. These cars are just modern enough that they can be privately owned and operated. We do not take the LMP1 hybrid models for this reason. Cars like the very first Audi R18 can run with the hybrid element suppressed, otherwise it adds too much cost and complexity. This is why we stopped the LMP1 entries at 2012, before hybrid really came in.

“These cars were incredible and there are so few possibilities for them to drive now. We will have the cream of these cars. It’s a generational thing how cars from the 1990s and 2000s have now become more popular. Today the fans that are 30-50 years old, they were dreaming of these cars, the ones they saw growing up that helped form their love and interest for the sport. New generations bring new nostalgia as you always love what you remembered growing up.”

There are also support races, with a special new addition celebrating classic NASCAR to mark 50 years since the first American stock cars were entered into the 24 Hours in 1976. Then there’s also Peter Auto/SRO’s new GT3 Revival Series, acting as a nod to the roots of what is now the world’s biggest single racing formula.

“I am sure we will have a different crowd for the Legend,” adds Ouayoun. “The Le Mans Classic has always been a very popular event and we want to keep that and not alienate anybody. My dream is that the new generation brings their parents to see what they love and then the parents bring their kids to Le Mans Classic Heritage to show what they loved in the ’50s and ’60s and when you were a real hero driver in a different time.

“I really think the two events will bring different generations, but the trigger of a group of friends or a family visiting either of the Le Mans Classic events will be ‘Come with me and let’s share something special’.”

Le Mans Classic Legend takes place from July 2-5, 2026. For more information and to order tickets, visit lemansclassic.com

The Le Mans Classic Legend Grids Explained

Grid 6
Prototypes 1972-1981 & GT 1975-1984

This was arguably the dawn of modern sports car engineering at La Sarthe. Prototypes evolved rapidly with models such as the V12-powered Matra, Mirage-Cosworth and then the Porsche 936, which became the first turbocharged car to win the 24 Hours in 1976. Highly modified production specials such as Porsche’s 935 spawned a new breed of high-power high-aero GT cars.

Grid 7
Group C 1982-1993

Many people consider this the defining era of the Le Mans 24 Hours, when what was conceived a fuel efficiency formula quickly became an all-out manufacturer war, drawing in brands such as Porsche, Jaguar, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Mazda and more. It gave us some of the all-time great sportscars, such as the Porsche 956/962, Jaguar’s XJR9-LM and the screaming Mazda 787B.

Grid 8
GT and Prototype 1994-1999

When Group C eventually ran out of steam, the GT class enjoyed a resurgence, largely driven by the invention of the BPR Global GT Series (BPR standing for Jürgen BARTH, Patrick PETER of Peter Auto fame – and Stéphane Ratel, of the SRO Motorsport Group). Enter ultra-high-performance GT1 designs such as the Mercedes-Benz CLK-LM, the McLaren F1 GTR, Maserati MC12 (although this never actually raced at Le Mans due to a homologation dispute) and Porsche’s 911 GT1-98.

Grid 9
Prototypes 2000-2005 & GT 2000-2010

Think Audi R8, Pescarolo, Bentley, Dallara, Courage… this was the era when the modern legends of Le Mans forged their reputations (such as a certain Tom ‘Mr Le Mans’ Kristensen). This was perhaps also the most popular era for GT cars, with Aston Martin finally returning to Le Mans with the DBR9 to take on Ferrari’s 550 Maranello, Corvette’s C6.R and Saleen’s S7… and not a small-capacity turbo in sight. Big power, big noise. Fantastic.

Grid 10
LMP1 2006-2012, LMP2 2006-2105 & GTE 2011-2015

The newest cars to join the party, and maybe the most exclusive. This was Le Mans’ fastest-ever era, as space-age prototypes pushed technology further than ever before. Audi and Peugeot diesels lapped quicker than a Porsche 917 had with no chicanes. A new golden age of manufacturer competition erupted in LMP1 while LMP2 and GTE entries grew to record levels. These cars will also compete in the Legend of Le Mans series, which will support the FIA WEC at three events this year (Imola, Spa and Bahrain).