A Very Different Le Mans 24 Hours
www.porscheroadandrace.com A very different Le Mans 24 Hours Published: 25th September 2020 By: Glen Smale Online version: https://www.porscheroadandrace.com/a-very-different-le-mans-24-hours/ Le Mans 24 Hours, 19/20 September 2020: The pre-race grid was a busy place despite the presence of the Covid-19 pandemic – note the empty grandstand The 2020 motor racing season will undoubtedly go down in history as the most unusual and disrupted year on record. Only twice has the Le Mans 24 Hour race been rescheduled from its traditional June slot, to a later date in September, the first being in 1968 when the race was run on 28/29 September due to ongoing unrest in Paris. The second occasion was this race just finished, this delay being due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, so it is quite significant that the race was still able to be contested at all in 2020. www.porscheroadandrace.com Right on cue, just as was forecast, it rained overnight at Le Mans following a week of intense heat, which was so unusual for September. The first race of the day on Saturday was the Porsche Carrera Cup Deutschland Round 1 at 09h15. Usually, a number of these cars are eliminated at the first turn into the Dunlop Bridge chicane as they all try to pile into the same little bit of track at the same time. It’s a classic case of trying to win the race at the first corner, but on Saturday this was not the case. It was almost as though the drivers had had a good talking to because, as the pace car came through the Ford Chicane and onto the start/finish straight to release the cars, the driver and passenger in the pace car could be seen to be waving their arms out of the window in an up-and-down fashion, motioning the group to slow down and be careful of overdoing it at the start.
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