The 1969 24 Hours of Le Mans was a motor race staged at the Circuit de la Sarthe, Le Mans, France on 14 and 15 June 1969. It was the 37th Grand Prix of Endurance and was the eighth round of the 1969 International Championship for Makes. The race was open to Group 6 Prototype Sports Cars, Group 4 Sports Cars and Group 3 Grand Touring Cars.
After 1967, the prototypes were limited to 3 liter engines, same size as in Formula One, but F1 engines did not last in endurance racing. Few such prototypes were entered, Ferrari even boycotted the 1968 season. To increase participation, "sports cars" of which dozens had been made were allowed to race with up to 5 liter capacity if homologated in the Gr. 4 sports car category, like the 1964 Ford GT40 Mk.I or the 1965 Lola T70. These types won the first two 1969 races before the Porsche 908/02 scored five wins in a row to secure the 1969 International Championship for Makes. In 1968, it had been the improved old Gulf-JWA GT40 of John Wyer which did win the 1968 WC and the postponed to September '68 Le Mans over the still unreliable Porsche 908.
With the Gr. 4 minimum number being lowered to 25 for 1969, Porsche took an unforeseen risk and invested millions in basically building 25 modern yet big-engine prototypes. In early 1966 they had built and sold 50+ Porsche 906 for the 2.0 liter Gr. 4 sports car category while Ferrari failed with the Dino 206 S. Now they enlarged the 3-litre flat-8-cylinder of the 908 into a 4.5-litre flat-12 and showed the required 25 Porsche 917 for homologation in April 1969. Porsche also had sorted out the 908 by introducing a 908/02 spyder version that won 5 championship heats in a row and secured the 1969 Championship for Makes. With two car types, they were strong favourites to achieve their first outright Le Mans win. The 917s, all produced up front as soon as possible, were not tested yet, and showed high speed instability at the Le Mans test day, made worse by the FIA banning wings after crashes in F1. At the first 917 races in May, at Spa and Nürburgring, the factory drivers preferred the 908. Porsche customer teams hesitated to purchase the unproven 917, but privateer John Woolfe acquired one just before the race.
It was the last year with the traditional "Le Mans" style start, in which the drivers run across the track to enter their cars, start them, and race away. This was introduced decades ago when cars were open and safety standards were not as strict. In the 1960s closed GT coupes with sometimes flimsy doors were common, and roll bars, helmets and belts came in use. The previous year, Willy Mairesse crashed on the first lap while trying to properly close the door of his Ford GT40 at speed on the Mulsanne Straight; the career-ending crash would have been avoided entirely if not for the hastiness of the Le Mans-style start. During the 1969 start, eventual winner Jacky Ickx famously staged his own one-man protest by walking to his GT40, and taking his time doing up his belts. Meanwhile, privateer John Woolfe ran with the other drivers, but with little experience in the very fast 917, he flipped on the opening lap near Maison Blanche corner, and not yet strapped in properly, was killed when he was ejected from the car that broke up.
The race was one of the most exciting in the event's history. Including several 911, more than one-third of the starting cars were Porsches, and the two mighty factory-entered 917s held the lead for 90% of the race before the drivetrains failed, like in most 908.
When also the Elford/Attwood 917's gearbox broke at 11 a.m., it was the Ford of Ickx and Jackie Oliver that took over the lead. The race ended in a 3-hour sprint, with the Ford battling the pursuing Porsche 908 of Hans Herrmann and Gérard Larrousse non-stop. With both cars having issues, in the end, the Ford GT40 Mk.I – the same chassis #1075 that had won the previous year – took the chequered flag just 120 metres ahead of the Porsche after 24 hours of racing.
Regulations In the 1967 race, the prototypes of Ferrari, 330P4 with 4 litre V12, and Ford GT40 Mk.IV with 7 Litre V8, had been very fast. Thus, starting in 1968, prototype cars in World Championship and at Le Mans were limited to 3 litres, same size as in Formula One since 1966. The F1 engines were not reliable for endurance racing, though. There were few entries, as Ferrari stayed absent in protest, and Ford did not really support the Ford P68. Only Alfa, Matra, and Porsche showed up with factory 3 litre entries, plus some private efforts. In addition, Gr.4 Sports Cars with engines up to 5 litre were allowed if at least 50 were produced, like Ford GT40 and Lola T70.
Heeding the calls of race promoters worried about diminishing fields, the FIA CSI sought to fix things by reducing the minimum production figure to run in Group 4 from 50 to 25. Even though they had a 5 litre engine capacity limit, it was reasoned that it would not be a difference as the old already produced cars were usually not as competitive as the newer Group 6 Prototypes. This however, left a flaw in the system for manufacturers with the resources and commitment to exploit the regulations. Ford had built over 100 GT40 to GT rules after 1963, but Ferrari failed to show enough Ferrari 250 LM for GT homologation, and Dino 206 S for Gr.4 in 1966. Porsche had been underdogs running engines up to 2 litre, bored out to 2.2 litre in 1967, and had provided homologated 2.0 litre 904 GT and Gr.4 906 and 910 to dozens of customers. Only in 1968 they entered the maximum capacity prototype class with their first 3 litre, only to be beaten by the introduction of an additional loop hole 5 liter sportscars category. Ferdinand Piëch was willing and able to step up into this category, too, and construct 25 new chassis of a new de facto 5 litre prototype, the 917, to get it homologated with a 4.5-litre engine for Group 4Spurring 2010, p.307-8 for races after April 1969, starting at the 1000km Spa.
This year the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) brought the time of start and finish forward to 2pm, to allow more time on Sunday afternoon for the French spectators to vote in the deciding second round of the 1969 French presidential election. New Armco crash barriers were installed around the circuit, including on the Mulsanne Straight, where there was previously no protection from the trees, houses and embankments in the event of a car leaving the track.Clausager 1982, p.159-61 Sandbanks were replaced by barriers.Moity 1974, p.122
Entries
Into the second year of the new 3-litre regulations for Group 6 Prototypes, the initial entries closed with 109 applications – the biggest number in the past decade. However, after the requisite culling 60 cars were accepted, but a number of withdrawals meant only 51 practiced with non-starters reducing the final grid to only 45, the smallest field in the decade. After a dominant season to date, Porsche had already won the 1969 International Championship for Makes and arrived with easily the biggest representation with 16 cars, a third of the field.
Category Classes PrototypeGroup 6 SportsGroup 4 GTGroup 3 TotalEntries Large-engines >2.0L classes14 (+1 reserve)11 (+3 reserves) 1 (+1 reserve)26 (+5 reserves) Medium-engines 1.6 / 2.0L classes 5 (+2 reserves) 1 (+1 reserve) 4 (+4 reserves)10 (+7 reserves) Small-engines 1.15 / 1.3L classes 5 0 0 5 (+0 reserves) Total Cars23 (+2 reserves)13 (+5 reserves) 5 (+5 reserves)41 (+12 reserves)
Porsche had already wrapped up the championship after the seven races to date. Starting in July 1968, Porsche made a surprising and very expensive effort to conceive, design and build a whole new car for the Group 4 Sport category with one underlying goal: to win its first overall victory at Le Mans. In only ten months, the first Porsche 917 prototype was developed with a fibreglass body and Porsche's first 12-cylinder engine. Bored out to 4.5-litres, made from titanium, magnesium and exotic alloys, it produced a mighty 520 bhp. The 917 included another feature which would prove to be controversial in the week leading up to the race: movable aerodynamic wings linked to the suspension.Clarke 1997, p.74-76: Motor Jun21 1969 These were banned by the CSI (Commission Sportive Internationale – the FIA's regulatory body) at the Monaco GP in May as dangerous. Porsche team manager, Rico Steinemann, protested that their test-sessions had shown the car was inherently unstable without them and that the cars had been homologated for Group 4 with the flaps.Spurring 2010, p.319-21 A last-minute decision the day before Le Mans by the FISA allowed them to race, although the 908s had to lose the flaps as they had previously run without them. Team Matra was particularly upset by this decision, but in a statement said they did not intend to protest. It was widely believed that if the ban was again reinstated because of a protest by other teams, Porsche would have pulled out of the 1969 race entirely.
By May the necessary 25 chassis were completed for homologation, intended to be sold to private racing teams at $35,000 each. The first was purchased by a private interest by the time of the Le Mans race, that of Briton John Woolfe. The cars had their first race at Spa, and three works entries were at Le Mans in langheck (longtail) form for Vic Elford/Richard Attwood and Rolf Stommelen/Kurt Ahrens, with Herbert Linge in the reserve car.
In the Prototype class, Porsche had three works 908s, also in langheck form, including regular team drivers Gerhard Mitter / Udo Schütz. This season's version was at least 20% lighter than the 1968 car. The new 908/2 spyder version that had been very successful through the season was run by the team's lead drivers, Jo Siffert and Brian Redman, through Siffert's sponsor, Hart Ski with strong works support. There were also a pair of privateer 910s in the 2-litre Prototype class.Spurring 2010, p.314-6
After a tight season last year, Ford were no longer as competitive as their Porsche rivals. Although the GT40 was showing its age, five were entered. John Wyer's J.W. Automotive, managed by David Yorke, chose not to run the disappointing Group 6 Mirage M2s and instead entered two of the cars they ran in the previous year's race. They kept their regular driving combinations: Jacky Ickx / Jackie Oliver and David Hobbs / Mike Hailwood. There were also entries for Alan Mann Racing and a race-debut for Reinhold Joest, as a driver.Spurring 2010, p.310-1
After an inauspicious debut in 1967, the Lola T70 Mk 3 had gradually improved, and with sufficient production now completed to put it into the Sports category, it could run the far more reliable, race-proven, Chevrolet 5-litre V8 engine. The new Mk 3B, designed by Eric Broadley, was the first racing car to use the new ultralight, ultra-strong, carbon-fibre. A victory in the opening championship round at Daytona for Roger Penske's team boded well. Lola withdrew its entries after Paul Hawkins burned to death in an accident in May driving a Lola at the RAC Tourist Trophy.Parker 2016, p.210 Without the works team, it was Scuderia Filipinetti who ran a car for Jo Bonnier/Masten Gregory.Spurring 2010, p.327
The SEFAC-Ferrari works team returned to Le Mans after a year's absence, with the new 312P prototype, a design strongly akin to the Can-Am 612P. It ran a 3-litre V12 engine based on the Ferrari Formula 1 engine, developing 430 bhp. Two cars were entered, for former race-winners Chris Amon and Pedro Rodriguez, partnered with hill-climb specialist Peter SchettyParker 2016, p.219 and David Piper respectively. The North American Racing Team (NART) once again had three different options entered in the Sports category: its 1965 race-winning 275LM car was back, with a new 365 GTB/4 in the over-2-litre class, and a Dino 206 S in the under-2-litre class.Spurring 2010, p.324