Tom Walkinshaw was bang on when he predicted it would take three years for Jaguar to win the Le Mans 24 Hours. That’s the Silk Cut TWR-Jaguar team, of course. An encouraging debut for TWR in 1986, after the US Group 44 team’s visits the previous two years, was followed by a proper challenge to Porsche in ’87. Another year on and it would be Jaguar’s turn.

The drivers involved in that historic race remember a confidence in the camp leading up to the race. “There was definitely a feeling that Jaguar was going to do it,” says Jan Lammers, one third of the winning line-up alongside Andy Wallace and Johnny Dumfries. “Everyone was so committed to making it happen and that year we did have the fastest car.”

That should, correctly, read Lammers and his team-mates had the fastest car. Asked which car from history he wished he’d raced, long-time Jaguar driver Martin Brundle came up with the number two Jaguar XJR-9LM that went on to win the race. Walkinshaw’s favoured son knew he was in trouble when Lammers flew on the Mulsanne Straight during the opening lap.

The crew of the winning Jag had come up with a last-minute set-up tweak. Engineer Eddie Hinckley dropped the rear ride height and the drivers went for it. “That meant we had less drag from the underwing and gained in top speed,” says Lammers. “It was that which made the car so quick.”

Lammers took the lead on the sixth lap, predictably on the Mulsanne, and he and his less experienced team-mates were consistently at the sharp end, taking a grip on the race in the early hours of Sunday morning. As the finish approached, they eked out a one-lap lead over the delayed Porsche. It wasn’t plain sailing for Jaguar. Each of its five cars had failed scrutineering and, as a result, made it into the pages of  The Times. The issue, the result of a manufacturing glitch, was easily overcome, but it was nothing compared with the problem that faced Lammers in the closing laps.

The Dutchman had overheard team-mate Raul Boesel recounting the tale of his retirement with gearbox failure shortly before 11pm. The noises were still echoing in his ears when he heard similar sounds from his own transmission. The quick-thinking Lammers made a split-second decision: he had fourth gear and was going to stick with it. The only problem? There was still considerably more than an hour to go and a final pitstop had yet to be made. Lammers recalls: “I told myself that was it, I wasn’t going to touch that lever any more.”

The torquey seven-litre Jaguar V12 proved up to the task of hauling the car around the track, and Jaguar went on to make the newspapers once more, for all the right reasons this time, the following morning. GW

The winners

1980 

Rondeau M379 
Jean Rondeau/Jean-Pierre Jaussaud,
4308km 
Pole goes to the fastest crew, rather than swiftest individual. Rondeau becomes first winning driver-constructor

1981 

Porsche 936 
Jacky Ickx/Derek Bell 
4825km

1982 

Porsche 956 
Jacky Ickx/Derek Bell
4899km 
New regulations impose 100-litre fuel tanks and limit cars to 24 pitstops. Porsches win every class

1983 

Porsche 956 
Vern Schuppan/Hurley Haywood/Al Holbert 
5048km 
Porsche’s 956s finish 1st-8th

1984 

Porsche 956B 
Henri Pescarolo/Klaus Ludwig 
4900km 
Porsche factory boycotts race due to row about fuel regulations

1985 

Porsche 956B 
Klaus Ludwig/Paolo Barilla/‘John Winter’,
5089km

1986 

Porsche 962C
Derek Bell/Hans Joachim Stuck/Al Holbert 
4973km 

1987 

Porsche 962C
Derek Bell/Hans Joachim Stuck/Al Holbert
4792km 
Increasing speeds lead to introduction of the Dunlop chicane

1988 

Jaguar XJR-9LM 
Jan Lammers/Johnny Dumfries/Andy Wallace,
5333km 
First Jaguar win since 1957. Roger Dorchy’s WM P87 hits 405kph (251mph) on the Mulsanne Straight

1989 

Sauber C9 
Jochen Mass/Manuel Reuter/Stanley Dickens,
5262km   
Political spat leads to the race’s exclusion from World Sports Car Championship for the first time since the inception of the series  back in 1953