The nine-times Le Mans 24 Hours winner Tom Kristensen has said he rates his second place at this year’s race as one of the highlights of his career but despite some debate over whether he may retire, the 47-year-old has no intention of calling it a day as yet.
Kristensen, alongside his team-mates Lucas di Grassi and Loïc Duval, took second place in round four of the World Endurance Championship in Texas on Saturday, ensuring a one-two for Audi, with the race won by this year’s 24 Hours champions, André Lotterer, Benoît Tréluyer and Marcel Fässler. It was a certainly a good run at the Circuit of the Americas to take second after gambling on staying out on wet tyres but for Kristensen, Le Mans in June was a clear stand out among his many appearances at the endurance classic.
Understandably so, since that second place at Circuit de la Sarthe really was quite the achievement. Kristensen’s No2 car had suffered a huge accident in practice on the Wednesday, when Duval crashed at the Porsche Curves. It had to be entirely rebuilt before the race and Duval replaced at short notice by Marc Gené. That they went on to lead and were in with a shot of winning until a turbo charger had to be replaced was an extraordinary feat.
“It was a gigantic team effort around our car,” he said. “I am so proud of it, the story of that race is the one about Le Mans that I will tell my grandchildren about in many years time.”
“Nobody would have put a dime on us on Wednesday evening,” he said. “There were many who thought we were out and gone, then the team showed so much character and got on with it and built virtually another car for us.
“In the race we were constantly improving and getting better, at midnight we were probably the fastest car on the circuit and getting closer to the leader and then all these things happened, old-school things,” he added. “First we had an injector failure before making the big leap forward and being in the lead. Then, when we had the turbo failure, I was completely focussed on trying to get the best out of the situation. To finish with a one-two was not in the slightest bit disappointing.”
The Danish driver took his first win at Le Mans, at which he has competed 18 times, for Porsche in 1997, won once with Bentley in 2003 but has dominated the event driving for Audi with a further seven victories – six consecutively between 2000 and 2005 – and the last in 2012 alongside Britain’s Allan McNish, yet this year’s race remains a highlight.
“I rank it very high,” he said. “It shows the commitment, the trust, the spirit, the right strengths of people, I was proud nobody gave up even though it would have been easy to do so. It was a fantastic effort.”
Neither is it one that he intends to be his last at La Sarthe. He describes his current ride as “the best and most agile Audi I have ever driven” and insists his enthusiasm for racing has not waned. “I love being part of sportscar racing,” he said. “We are a team, when you win you share it, and when you do not you support each other. You are more dependent now on every detail being correct. The technical side is so advanced but the human effort is more important.”
World champions last year, he and his team-mates trail the leading Toyota drivers by 24 points with four rounds to go and for the moment pursuing that second title and making it 10 wins at Le Mans remain firmly on the agenda. “I am highly motivated, and focused on trying to win this year’s world championship,” he said. “I am enjoying myself very much, I’m sure I will be glad one day in five or 10 years’ time to tell people that I will stop racing. But not yet.”
