Skip advert
Advertisement
Features

McLaren F1 at the Le Mans 24 hours

In 1995, the McLaren F1 went racing, culminating in an assault on Le Mans. Here's the story

The story of McLaren’s debut win at the 1995 Le Mans remains one of the great legends of La Sarthe. Even now, some fifteen years after the event, the significance of what happened during those 24 hours remains truly remarkable.

Lest we forget, the F1 was the world’s most famous car in 1995. Everyone was buzzing with excitement, rapt by its power, price, pace and peerless quality. That would have been enough for most supercar manufacturers, but not McLaren. Having taken the decision to develop a racing version and supply it to privateer teams for the BPR GT1 Endurance series, an assault on Le Mans was inevitable.

Advertisement - Article continues below

Perhaps because chance of an overall victory against the Courage and Kremer prototypes was thought to be slim, McLaren’s support for the programme was deliberately low-key. Independent teams would run the cars, as they did in the BPR endurance series, but McLaren did co-ordinate a 24-hour test at Magny Cours in order to expose any weaknesses in the package and subsequently develop upgrades, which would then be made available to all the teams running F1s.

The car used for this test was owned by McLaren, but thanks to sponsorship from the Japanese cosmetic surgery practice, Ueno Clinic, sufficient budget was found to run the car at Le Mans too. A team was duly formed by a small nucleus of McLaren employees, who bolstered their ranks with experienced endurance racing engineers and known associates of McLaren.

Skip advert
Advertisement
Advertisement - Article continues below

One of the key members of the newly-formed Kokusai Kaihatsu Racing team was Graham Humphrys, then race engineer, now director of GT1 Design and a driving force behind Aston Martin’s Nürburgring racing efforts. Working alongside Paul Lanzante and Geoff Hazell (who ran the McLaren GTR programme), it was Humphrys who effectively engineered the No.59 car, making all the calls relating to its pre-race preparations and maintenance during the race itself.

Advertisement - Article continues below

Though the car’s progress appeared imperious from the spectator banking (I know, I was there), the Ueno Clinic F1 almost didn’t complete the first hour of the race. Humphrys explains: ‘We had a torrid time in the build-up to the race. JJ (Lehto) was phenomenally quick whenever he drove the car, but he’d bent a few wishbones by clouting the kerbs in qualifying.

'Then he buzzed the motor, which meant we had to speak with the BMW guys, who were looking after the engines. If an engine exceeded 9000rpm they felt it was compromised, and that was their view of our engine. There was a spare, but I had to make the call to Ron Dennis to tell him we needed to have it. He listened intently, asked if anyone else had a similar need for the motor, and then gave us the okay to use it.

‘The engine swap meant we were working late into the night. Actually we were still working in the early hours of race day morning. At around 2am I can remember us scrabbling round the paddock trying to load the car onto a flat-bed transporter – we even enlisted a few drunk spectators to help us push it onto the truck – before taking to the aerodrome across the road from the main entrance for a shakedown test.

>Watch - McLaren P1 GTR on track

Skip advert
Advertisement

Recommended

£2m McLaren W1 makes public debut – 1257bhp P1 successor eyes Ferrari F80
McLaren W1
News

£2m McLaren W1 makes public debut – 1257bhp P1 successor eyes Ferrari F80

First F1, then P1… and now W1. The next chapter in McLaren’s Ultimate Series has arrived to challenge Ferrari’s forthcoming new hypercar, and we've ta…
14 Jul 2025
Lanzante 95-59 debuts as £1.2m tribute to McLaren F1’s Le Mans win
Lanzante 95-59
News

Lanzante 95-59 debuts as £1.2m tribute to McLaren F1’s Le Mans win

Lanzante’s celebration of its Le Mans win in 1995 has 850bhp and uses a McLaren 750S as its basis, revealed at the 2025 Goodwood Festival of Speed
14 Jul 2025
McLaren adds ex-Ferrari boss to its team following reshuffle
McLaren Artura Spider
News

McLaren adds ex-Ferrari boss to its team following reshuffle

Former Ferrari Chairman Luca Montezemolo joins McLaren to spearhead growth under new owners
30 Jun 2025
Le Mans 24 Hours 2025: Ferrari claims victory for the third time running
Ferrari 499P Le Mans winner
News

Le Mans 24 Hours 2025: Ferrari claims victory for the third time running

The world’s most significant endurance race returned for the 93rd time with a packed grid of 62 cars vying for victory, but Ferrari came out on top (a…
17 Jun 2025
Skip advert
Advertisement

Most Popular

TVR: Why we think it’s all over
TVR Griffith
Opinion

TVR: Why we think it’s all over

There’s barely a flicker of life when it comes to TVR and the ‘new’ Griffith. We can only fear the worst
17 Jul 2025
Save £30k on a new Range Rover and buy a Renault 5 with the savings!
Range Rover
News

Save £30k on a new Range Rover and buy a Renault 5 with the savings!

Discounts on new Range Rovers are so big you could buy a new Renault 5 with the money you save…
15 Jul 2025
​Best hot hatchbacks 2025 – affordable new performance cars
Best hot hatchbacks 2025
Best cars

​Best hot hatchbacks 2025 – affordable new performance cars

Contracted though the hot hatch market may be, there are still some great models out there, from the electric Alpine A290 to the five-cylinder Audi RS…
14 Jul 2025