LE MANS Ferrari returns to make history at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The 499P number 51 driven by Calado, Pier Guidi and Giovinazzi won the French marathon after a breathtaking battle with Toyota that lasted almost a day. A very important triumph for the Prancing Horse who returned to racing in French endurance in the year of the circuit’s centenary, after half a century of absence in the Hypercars, the premier class of the World Endurance Championship (WEC).
Ferrari’s last victory at Le Mans dates back to 1965 when Rindt and Gregory they drove the 250 LM in triumph (with the complicity of the «ghost pilot», Ed Hugus). Ferrari managed to beat Toyota, the favorite of this edition and undisputed winner of the most famous 24-hour race in the world since 2018. A head-to-head Japan-Italy match that lasted throughout the marathon, with the Ferraris starting first and second (Nielsen on number 50 and Calado on number 51) and immediately overtaken by Buemi’s Toyota GR010 number 8. It was just the beginning of an infinite elastic that has never seen anyone escape and accumulate a great advantage and that until the end kept everyone in suspense between rain, sun, heat and cold.
As darkness fell, Pier Guidi’s Rossa was ahead of the Toyotas that followed close behind, but the first twist came at midnight. To avoid a spinning Porsche GT, Pier Guidi’s Ferrari ended up in the gravel and lost half a lap before rejoining the track in fifth position. An hour later it’s Toyota that has problems: Kobayashi’s number 7 car is forced to retire due to a strong rear-end collision against the number 66 Ferrari Gt and the Japanese manufacturer leaves the lead to Peugeot for a few laps before taking the lead again with the number 8 of Buemi, Hartley and Hirakawa. At two o’clock another twist. A stone on the track damaged the cooling system of the electric motor of the Ferrari 50 driven by Fuoco, forcing the car to a long stop and the Japanese cars to gain a bit of a margin.
From the middle of the race the heart-pounding head-to-head begins. In the middle of the night a very fast lap of the number 51 with Pier Guidi at the wheel allows Ferrari to catch the number 8 Toyota: at the pit stop Ferrari starts first, while Toyota stops to change a piece of the front. From this moment begins the domination of the Ferrari 51 carried on at a fast pace and without hesitation. At the first light of dawn, the Reds are in the lead with a minute ahead of the Toyota, hearts are beating, but we try to keep our feet on the ground because the unexpected is just around the corner.
And in fact at 10.32, five and a half hours from the end of the race, the dream seems to shatter: a system reset of Giovinazzi’s 51 stopped in the pits causes a one-minute delay, Buemi’s Toyota number 8 passes. The distance between the two hypercars was less than a second and at 10.48 Pier Guidi sensationally managed to overtake the Toyota at the second Hunaudières chicane.
The Piedmontese driver pushes hard and regularly but Toyota he doesn’t give up and resists until the unthinkable. With three hours to go, the gap between the Reds and the Japanese is just 5.7 seconds, even the smallest mistake could cost the entire race. In the following hour and a half, Ferrari built up the lead, second after second, until at 2.16 pm Hirakawa’s number eight Toyota lost its rear and spun, crashing into the barriers of the Arnage corner. The screams of the Ferrari fans echoed around the circuit, while Hirakawa returned to the pits where the front was replaced and exited with a delay of more than 3 minutes and 22 seconds. It looks done.
One hour and ten from the end of the race, the 499P number 51 returns for the last tire change and refueling before the end: the driver who will bring the Prancing Horse to the finish line at Le Mans is Alessandro Pier Guidi. The number 51 turns regularly to keep what it deservedly earned, but the surprises are not finished. Pier Guidi goes back to the pits to refuel but the car doesn’t seem to restart and restarts after a minute with bated breath. Toyota gains ground, remains lucid for the last twenty minutes of the race. But it’s all useless: the Ferrari of Calado, Guidi and Giovinazzi crossed the finish line first (341 laps with a gap from the Japanese by over a minute and a half), winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans 58 years after the last time. The twin of Fuoco, Molina and Nielsen, finishes fifth. It is a day that in Maranello they will remember forever, Antonello Coletta – the manager of the Cavallino endurance program – takes the podium to the tune of Mameli’s anthem. He believed in it from day one, when the 499P appeared for the first time at Imola last autumn. Returning to the World Prototype Championship was president John Elkann’s big gamble, he won it.