Riding shotgun at Le Mans with its most successful driver ever

I am not LeBron James. For starters, I’m at least 3 inches shorter than the all-time leading NBA scorer. Plus, I definitely don’t own a Porsche 918 Spyder and my security detail is pretty small these days. In fact, when appearing at Le Mans in 2023, the same year the NBA star attended, I made very few demands at all. Just Flexiplus tickets for the Eurotunnel, an M5 CS for the journey and ice-cold Dr Pepper replenished regularly in the fridge of the on-site RV. Camping? Oh no, the RV was in addition to the hotel room. Do I look like a savage?

LeBron signalled the start of the Le Mans 24 Hours in its centenary year by waving the tricolour as the Hypercar field poured along the pit straight at precisely 4pm on Saturday, June 10. He didn’t much fancy talking beforehand. I was at Le Mans working for Eurosport and my sole pre-race mission was to get to the big dude surrounded by other big dudes in suits and almost every photographer on the teeming grid. It was a hopeless task. Except I had a secret weapon. Tom Kristensen – y’know, the guy who has won Le Mans a record nine times – also works for Eurosport and nobody opens doors at Le Mans like TK. Literally. He can go anywhere, do anything. He has earned that right.

Tom is the Grand Marshal on the occasion of the race’s 100th anniversary and that means he’s dragged from pillar to post for various duties. But he also gets to meet LeBron well before the melee on the grid and, of course, he gets the live interview as I tag along. Thank you, TK. What a legend.

Rewind to 1.45pm, and TK is opening doors again. This time to a Porsche 992 Turbo S with some tasty Manthey modifications. One of the official safety cars for the World Endurance Championship. The idea was that Tom, the Grand Marshal, would give LeBron, the official honorary starter, a lap of the circuit at a sedate pace to give him a taste of what this race is all about. Then somebody mentioned insurance. And what happens whenever anyone mentions insurance? Exactly.

TK is ready, the marshals have been briefed… but there’s no passenger. The nice lady from the ACO says Tom can still do the lap if he wants. ‘Okay,’ he says. Followed by: ‘And I’m taking him.’ He’s pointing at me. There’s a momentary silence. One of those silences almost certain to be filled with an ACO official saying ‘That’s not possible’. So I fill it with some confident bluster, ask if there’s a helmet available and jump into the Porsche. Once I’m in, nobody is getting me out. I’ve never been around La Sarthe and Tom f**king Kristensen is offering to guide me around this place that I’ve been watching on the TV since I was a kid and reading about forever. A couple of minutes later we’re waved onto the track.

The pitlane exit closed just a few minutes ago for competitors to make their way around to the grid so there’s the chance of a bit of slow-moving traffic. But a slow-moving Hypercar, P2 entry or GTE‑Am car isn’t that slow-moving. So we’ll probably be fine. Tom says he can push to 70 per cent. However, his definition appears to be a little off. We rip away from the pits at full throttle, rattle the kerbs on the chicane before the Dunlop bridge and Tom catches a wicked slide as we tumble down the New Esses.

The scale of the track is incredible. It’s vast. And the speeds! Even knowing all the facts and having watched the cars howl along endless flat-out sections for many, many years, it’s not until I’m on the hallowed tarmac with the most successful driver ever to race here that I can comprehend just how wildly fast it is. It helps that right now our 70 per cent lap is passing at 300kph. Tom is calm and has the weird economy of movement that all top racers possess. And, I’m pleased to report, he still appears to have only one speed. This might not be qualifying pace but let’s say it’s a race stint hunting down the leader. It’s also an absolute pleasure to witness.

The Turbo S touches over 280kph several more times and, to be honest, even with Tom’s commentary I find it hard to decipher exactly where I am on the lap. So I just phase everything out, enjoy the fluid blur of the trees and the way the white central road markings blend into a shadowy solid line as the speed grows and grows and grows. It’s such a different challenge to my beloved Nürburgring but the sense of fluidity is eerily similar and there are times when it feels almost like flight. What a place. LeBron has missed a proper once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

The race itself was a corker and although it was mired in BoP wrangling, be in no doubt that Ferrari deserved the win. To build a brand new prototype racer and find a way to make it fast enough to shock the established competition and reliable enough to cope with the demands of this place is remarkable. If Toyota had won they would've deserved it, too. Or Cadillac. Or Porsche. If you win Le Mans you deserve to win Le Mans. I’m glad I got to experience it with somebody who deserved to win it nine times. TK, I owe you.