Welcome to Le Mans Legends

Since we published our last Le Mans special edition in 2023 – 100 Years of the World’s Greatest Race – to coincide with the centenary of the Le Mans 24 Hours, there’s been a burning question: what about the remaining vast amount of wonderful content dwelling in our archives for which there was no space?

Motor Sport and Le Mans share a common theme, in that this magazine is celebrating its centenary now, meaning we’ve covered every edition of Le Mans, bar one (the first race did take place a year before we were born, so you can’t blame us for that!).

That historical link has resulted in hundreds of journalistic gems, from race reports to track tests, interviews with key players, every defining moment covered in period, and insights unavailable to any other title. In this collection you won’t find the most obvious content. We covered the story of Mr Le Mans Tom Kristensen in our first issue, along with those of fellow endurance icons Derek Bell, Henri Pescarolo and more, plus ranked our all-time top drivers.

This time we’ve spread the net wider. We bring you more insight into other heroic figures from across the years, delve beneath the bodywork of some of the greatest cars to discover the motivations behind them, and catalogue some of the standout moments that have helped shape the world’s greatest race over the last 101 years.

CONTENTS

THE MEN
6 Jacky Ickx interview
22 Gendebien: Belgium’s best?
24 The glory of the Bentley Boys
34 Lunch with Oliver Gavin
42 Ferrari’s quest to win Le Mans

THE MACHINES
53 Trying Tazio’s Alfa Romeo
58 Ford GT: modern & classic
70 Peugeot 908 track test
78 Bentley (not Audi’s) weapon
88 Origins of the Audi R8
98 Porsche 917 on track

THE MOMENTS
108 Top 10 Le Mans moments
120 The birth of Le Mans
124 Jaguar’s coming of age
129 Jaguar’s finest moment: 1988
134 McLaren’s massive upset
142 Goodbye LMP1
156 Ferrari’s glorious return

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