Report: TK's record victory

The Team Goh Audi, driven by Kristensen, Ara and Rinaldo Capello, inherited the lead from the Veloqx car in the 16th hour of the race when Herbert was forced to pit to repair damaged rear suspension and then held on to the lead despite a superb fightback from Herbert, Davies and Guy Smith. In the final hour Herbert consistently lapped up to four seconds faster than the leader, but it simply wasn't enough in the closest finish in recent history.

"This is the best day of my life," said Ara afterwards. "There was a lot of pressure because I wanted to win this race so much for Tom [Kristensen]. Now I feel all of the pressure is gone. The Audi is just a great car, it is simply unbelievable."

The Team Goh car spun at the start when Capello had a brake balance problem that caused it to lose three minutes, but as problems hit the other cars - including massive accidents for Allan McNish and JJ Lehto in the second hour - the Japanese-run R8 slowly worked back into the frame.

By early morning it was within a lap of the leading Herbert/Smith/Davies Veloqx car, thanks to storming night-time quadruple stints from Kristensen and Capello, and was perfectly placed to take advantage when Veloqx hit trouble.

Smith reckons that the problem, a broken pushrod on the Veloqx R8 that led every lap of the first 16 hours, may have begun to take effect as early as the second stint. All three drivers complained of understeer and last year's winner compared the handling of the R8 at the time as "like driving a speedboat".

Later as Davies was pushing to catch Capello, the Englishman spun. "We had some electrical boxes that were loose in the car," Davies said, "they were rattling around in the peddle box and I couldn't brake properly and that was it."

For Kristensen it was almost all too much after becoming perhaps the most successful driver of all time at Le Mans: "It was thrilling at the end," he said. "The extra excitement made the wait for the finish seem longer than usual. Anyway you win Le Mans is great, I'll take it anyway it comes.

"I used to watch Jacky Ickx when I was a kid, and I can never even of dreamed that I would one day achieve this. I can only say I'm very proud. Other drivers say I'm a lucky bastard to have all these wins, but I can live with that."

JJ Lehto brought home the Champion Audi home third. The Finn, along with team-mates Emanuele Pirro and Marco Werner, put on an amazing show to fight back through the field after spending 45-minutes in the pits in the second hour repairing heavy front-end damage to the R8 when Lehto crashed on oil at the Porsche Curves while running third.

Just ahead of him at the time was Allan McNish in the sister Veloqx machine. The Scot also crashed on the oil and hit the barriers at 170mph. Allan was badly shaken and, although he brought his heavily damaged car back to the pits, he would take no further part in the race to his immense disappointment.

Veloqx set about repairing that car, however, and after over an hour in the pits it was was back on track. That in itself is astonishing given the severity of the impact. The car eventually finished fifth with Frank Biela and Pierre Kaffer sharing out McNish's driving duties between them.

Henri Pescarolo's all-French C60 driven by Soheil Ayari, Eric Comas and Benoit Treluyer had a splendid run to finish fourth. The team was never out of the top four after the first couple of hours, and only surrendered third place to the charging Champion Audi on Sunday morning.

Jan Lammers brought his Racing For Holland Dome car home sixth in the LM1 class and seventh overall but the sister car driven by Justin Wilson, Ralph Firman and Tom Coronel crashed out in the 22nd hour. Wilson ran as high as third on Saturday evening, but a two major gearbox problems and an issue with brakes delayed the car badly.

Oliver Gavin, Olivier Beretta and Jan Magnussen won a classic racelong battle with the Prodrive Ferrari team for Corvette in the GTS class. The Chevys eventually finished first and second in class and sixth and eighth overall. Ron Fellows, Johnny O'Connell and Max Papis surviving two visits to the wall on their way to runner-up slot.

On his Le Mans debut, rally legend Colin McRae finished third in class in the healthiest Ferrari with co-drivers Rickard Rydell and Darren Turner.

The Petersen White Lightning Porsche, driven by Jorg Bergmeister, Patrick Long and Sascha Maassen dominated the GT class.

Ara/Capello/Kristensen Audi R8 LM1 379 laps completed
Davies/Herbert/Smith Audi R8 LM1 +41.354s
Lehto/Werner/Pirro Audi R8 LM1 368 laps
Ayari/Comas/Treluyer Pescarolo-Judd LM1 361 laps
Biela/Kaffer/McNish Audi R8 LM1 350 laps
Gavin/Beretta/Magnussen Corvette GTS 345 laps
Lammers/Dyson/Kaneishi Dome-Judd LM1 341 laps
Fellows/O'Connell/Papis Corvette GTS 334 laps
McRae/Rydell/Turner Ferrari 550 GTS 329 laps
Maasen/Bergmeister/Long Porsche GT 327 laps
Enge/Kox/Menu Ferrari 550 GTS 325 laps
Kurosawa/Nishizawa/Oriodo Porsche GT 322 laps
Kelleners/Ortelli/Dumas Porsche GT 321 laps
Bouchut/Goueslard/Dupard Ferrari 550 GTS 317 laps
Burgess/Collin/Bagnall Porsche GT 317 laps
Alphand/Laveille/Almeras Porsche GT 316 laps
Stirling/Lupberger/McGarrity Nasamax-Judd LM1 316 laps
Donaldson/Fisken/Nielsen Porsche GT 314 laps
Wilson/Montain/Hugenholtz Ferrari 360 GT 311 laps
Andre/Leuenberger/Vanni Lola-Judd LM1 300 laps
Berridge/Caine/Stockton TVR GT 300 laps
Tomlinson/Greensall/Evans TVR GT 291 laps
Khan/Smith/Sugden Porsche GT 283 laps
Nielsen/Elgaard/Moller Lister LM1 279 laps
Binnie/Field/Sutherland Lola-Judd LM2 278 laps
Terada/Roussel/Porta WR LM2 270 laps
Sharpe/Hyde/Cunningham Morgan GT 200 laps
Coronel/Wilson/Firman Dome-Judd LM1 302 laps
Collard/Bourdais/Minassian Pescarolo-Judd LM1 282 laps
Newton/Erdos/Kinch Lola-MG LM1 256 laps
Short/Barff/Barbosa Dallara-Judd LM1 230 laps
Hindery/Lieb/Rockenfeller Porsche GT 223 laps
Katoh/Michigami/Fukuda Dome-Mugen LM1 206 laps
Hezemans/Deletraz/Barde Ferrari 575 GTS 200 laps
Bosch/Sullivan/Biagi Ferrari 575 GTS 167 laps
Wallace/Brabham/Shimoda Zytek LM1 163 laps
Rosa/van Merkstein/Caffi Porsche GT 148 laps
Bouvet/Gommendy/Briere WR LM2 137 laps
Melo/Daoudi/de Fournoux Ferrari 360 GT 133 laps
Frei/Gounon/Hancock Courage-AER LM2 127 laps
Jeanette/Pickering/Derlot Courage-Willman LM2 124 laps
Maurylaribiere/Boulay/Besson Reynard-Lehman LM1 122 laps
Belmondo/Gosselin/Saviozzi Courage-AER LM2 80 laps
Vasiliev/Fomenko/Nearn Porsche GT 65 laps
Bourdais/Blanchemain/Berville Panoz LM1 54 laps
Andrews/Lockie/Kumpen Lola-Caterpillar LM1 35 laps
Field/Dayton/Connor Lola-Judd LM1 29 laps
Warnock/Matthews/Daniels Porsche 27 laps