WEEKEND AT LE MANS

[Music] hello hello in a few minutes at four o'clock exactly the lamar international 24-hour car days will begin this year as you know we are celebrating the 50th birthday of the automobile club and west the organizers of this the world's greatest sports congress over 50 cars in the hands of some of the finest drivers in the world are getting ready to celebrate this half century mechanical focus competitors are requested to get to their marks at once [Music] pit scrutineers have exactly 10 minutes for their final checks [Music] hello drivers are requested to get to the places assigned to them standby five four three two one zero [Music] they're off it's a spectacular mass start and a deafening row along this endless road let's seize the chance to point out the famous hazards along this nine mile circuit which drivers who finish will have left 300 times here's the famous tech rouge red bank corner then comes the long straight la unadir where the drivers go all out at times touching nearly 200 miles an hour at such speeds these braking signs are critical for the end of this owner's ear straight the road twists in a sharp right angle the famous moose and corner luckily provided the slip road for drivers in difficulty [Music] ah number four gets his jagger onto the circuit [Music] a few hundred yards after the museum corner we have the arnages s bends which bring us into the second straight running past the stands [Music] so to the completion of a land this 24 hour beginning with extremely high speed racing a real slogging match between the high powered trunks already coron's ferrari has retired and now number seven mike hawthorne and his ferrari are in the lead followed by number two bana and his maserati and his teammate sterling boss in the number one maserati then comes number three the flock of uf jaguar then number four the duncan hamilton gregory jaguar followed by number 20 attorney brooks in his aston martin the timekeepers announced officially that the lead record which has just been broken by hawthorne number seven ferrari has an average of nearly 124 miles an hour has been broken again by the french driver villar in maserati number two at a speed of over 125 miles an hour hawthorne has just completed the first ever under four minute lap at le mans yes it's certainly a records matching race we're seeing today at the moment number four jaguar holds the flying kilometer record at 178.8 miles an hour after appeal change which is lost in the lead mike hawthorne tears off after jobera [Music] mera the high power cards are giving no quarter in this ruthless battle the old saying that le mans lost in the first three hours is once again forgotten in their eagerness drivers seem to have lost sight of the final day of this 24-hour race [Music] of course the public follows all the ups and downs every dramatic moment in breathless excitement and soon we begin to wonder how long the drivers and the machines will stand up to such a pace [Music] the medium-powered cars like number 61 ferrari though not actually taking part in this giant slogging match are all the same being influenced by it and it becomes obvious that this fantastic battle will affect the final result with better and see more out it's now the turn of their teammates martin shell in maserati number one out of the race with a broken back axel after a gruelling three hours for over three hours they've been tearing round they're still 21 hours to go and already some of the most powerful cars are [ __ ] let's go back to yesterday when great care was being taken by the mechanics and preparing the cars for the fray the drivers were practicing continually there's fancy [Music] let's go back 50 years the time when the automobile club the west was born if cars as old as the club had raced today they would look like this in this modern setting of le mans they looked terribly old-fashioned [Music] how will the racing car today compare with the car tomorrow the mass production car owes much to these thoroughbreds but equally to the small high-performance cars like the lotus and pannar and also to the efforts of the enthusiast [Music] which was well placed in the race is also making a short routine stop at the pits [Music] hour after hour the race goes on after the red hot pace the first few hours the positions are becoming stabilized and interest in the race flags a little anyway no public remain in the continual trance of excitement and so the crowd relaxes another aspect of this lemon 24-hour race and not the least a picturesque either spectators old and young seek a means of escape from the magic circle in which the cars imprison them but wherever you go whatever you do the role of the engines keeps your head swimming and is inescapable to the last second of the race you still around sleep eat enjoy yourself and daydream as you watch the cars it's a zoo a village fair a surrealist belly all rolled into one that is the atmosphere of the 24 hour of the hmong [Music] how are you working buddy me takes over from his co-driver and now the drivers have to face a new obstacle darkness devano will have to be shaken out of his sleep his co-driver peron comes in with ferrari number 27 no driver is allowed to remain at the wheel continuously for more than 36 laps tavano takes over [Music] brooks and cunningham reed third ferrari number nine draw to be entertained jaguar number three has covered 99 laps in seven hours 16 cars are already out of the race [Music] there are still 38 cars roaring down this circuit and how many of them will come through the dangers of the night while the machines hurtle on at speeds of up to 170 miles an hour the funnel affair increases around this endless and tremendously exacting road [Music] happy new year [Music] the grey light of dawn follows the sleepless night and with it appears the morning mist another danger which obliges competitors to take risks in order to keep up their average since the night before the jaguars have built up a resounding lead the two entered by the accuracy numbers 3 and 15 along with three other privately owned jaguars are making the pace five jaguars on the leaderboard yet nobody seems to be there to applaud this unprecedented feat the unique community of le mans has finally been conquered by sleep fatigue has beaten the crowd just as has beaten many of the machines some left abandoned on the edge of the road [Music] [Music] but there are still 25 cars in the race more than enough to attract the second day's crowd the sunday crowd [Laughter] [Music] foreign [Applause] is still in the lead with an overall average of more than 115 miles an hour number three is now seven laps ahead of its teammate jaguar number 15 driven by sanderson and vlogs in third place 11 maps behind cambodia and luca in their jaguar portfolio and gruselle in another jaguar are lying fourth 17 laps behind and so when the inhabitants of our mushroom town begin to feel the pangu hunger and settle down for the biggest picnic of the year on the track the result is a foregone conclusion unless a dramatic turn in events a possibility comes to disturb the picnickers [Music] the four cars with engines of over four meters are all out of the rest of the ten cars between three and four leaders six are still in and five of them are dangerous it looks as though jaguar cannot fail to win duet gets ready to take over from his co-driver progress at the wheel of jaguar number three which is still leading we must also note the remarkable performance put up by the 750 and 1100 cc lotus cars which still need their respective classes [Music] [Music] jaguar number three continues on its triumphant way victorious against time fatigue darkness and mist not to mention the strain of the closing stages ron flockart has taken over the wheel for the last time a record average of 113.8 miles an hour over a record distance of 2731 miles [Music] have put their signature to this 50th anniversary race their victory is that a restraint and common sense it is a lesson from which car builders and designers all over the world will profit in the future many congratulations we are very very proud the fifth jaguar victory and the 11th british victory at le [Music] [Applause] [Music] moment [Music] you