74th Le Mans 24 hrs

In 1959 Roy Salvadori and Carroll Shelby drove the achingly beautiful Aston Martin DBR1 to outright victory in the famous 24 hours of Le Mans.  Thirty-one years after the marque had debuted at the famous La Sarthe circuit, they drove to an impressive win in a race that would see all 3 Ferraris retire through mechanical failure confirming that fragility had no place in the most famous of endurance races.

Fast forward to Saturday 17th June 2006, 5pm.  As the lights go green, Le Mans will once again feel the thunder of Aston Martins in racing colours as 4 DBR9s start their campaign to dominate the GT1 class at this years race.  Two cars will wear the historic Aston Martin Racing Green colour as they are being campaigned by Aston Martin Racing themselves, with the others being privately entered.  Whilst outright victory would be nothing short of miraculous (the LMP1 cars will take care of that) the DBR9s will be out to stamp their place in front of the Corvettes and Ferraris.

Le Mans is one of the blue chip races.  Next to the Monaco Grand Prix and the Indy 500, Le Mans draws the crowds like no other.  It has almost festival feel to it, with many spectators camping over the weekend.  And HWM will be there, flying the flag for Aston Martin.  Our love affair with this French circuit runs deep with us visiting many times as both spectators and competitors.  This year we will be there to host our clients who have taken the opportunity to indulge in the VIP hospitality that is being laid on for them by Aston Martin (its a hard life, I know!).

Our Sales Specialist, Bryan, will be there with his wife Sharon, both Le Mans vigins.  We will have an updated story after the event for those of you who didn't manage to make it down there (or were glued to a certain other sport on Saturday 17th June!).

Maybe we will see 2 victories for English teams that weekend?