2021 24 Hours of Le Mans - Peter Auto Endurance Racing Legends

Not just today’s crop of prototypes and GT-class racing cars were out on the Circuit de la Sarthe for the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Peter Auto’s Endurance Racing Legends series held two races on Friday and Saturday, featuring a dizzying array of Le Mans veterans from the 1990s and 2000s.

DK Engineering race prepared and supported the Ferrari 550 Maranello Prodrive of Max Girardo and James Cottingham, which was driven by Max for the weekend. James meanwhile raced the Dallara SP1 which was prepared by Pursuit. The Pursuit team also prepared the Riley & Scott of Richard Cook, a car previously handled by DK Engineering.

In the first race on Friday, James and Florent Moulin in Dallaras, as well as Shaun Lynn in the Bentley Speed 8, sprinted right to the start of the pack. Having started on pole, James maintained the lead until his Dallara spun just was few minutes before the end of the race, forcing him off the track and to finish in in second to last place, despite clocking the fastest lap of the race.

Investigations into the cause of the spin after the race found that a small water bleed hose had failed, spraying water onto the rear tyres. The Pursuit team was able to rectify this in advance of Saturday’s race. With his eyes on the top step of the podium, James kept the pressure one from start to finish and managed to take the chequered flag in first place. Further back on the grid, Max finished 6th in class and 14th overall in the 550, with Richard Cook one spot behind at 15th and 7th in class.

The full 24 Hours of Le Mans proved to be a very exciting race with Toyota Gazoo Racing taking their fourth overall win in a row in the hypercar class, with upstarts Glickenhaus Racing finishing in a seriously impressive 4th and 5th overall, four and seven laps behind the winning car respectively. LMP2 and LMP2 Pro-Am were dominated by the Orecas of Team WRT and DragonSpeed USA, while Ferrari saw a similar clean sweep of the GTE Pro and Am classes. Both winning 488 GTE Evos were campaigned by AF Corse, a seriously impressive accomplishment for the team.

550 Maranello Images Courtesy of Drew Gibson/Girardo & Co. Dallara images courtesy of Rob Overy and Brecht Decanq.