What makes the Le Mans 24 Hours so special?

The Le Mans 24 Hours is one of the events on the motorsport calendar, a race steeped in history and iconic moments. The stories of the race are well told, but it is often the experience that sticks with people the longest and creates the strongest memories.

Here are five accounts of what makes Le Mans so special.

First impressions are always spectacular - Rainier Ehrhardt

Ask anyone who's been lucky enough to experience Le Mans in person and the chances are they'll launch into the story of their first time. It's a measure of the impact the event has on a newbie. Each story is by definition unique, but is somehow a shared experience, nonetheless.

As a young boy, my French father moved our family from the United States, where he'd met my mother, back to France to be closer to his roots. He settled on la Sarthe because his brother lived in a small town you've likely heard of: Arnage. The move happened at the end of May in 1988, and we stayed with my aunt and uncle while we waited for the container full of our belongings to cross the Atlantic. 

As June arrived, a family friend offered to take my father and me to see ‘les vingt-quatre heures’ as locals refer to it. I was young, completely overwhelmed by all the newness around me, and understood all of three words of French. But learning that there were race cars not far away piqued my interest, as most of the Sundays in my life until then had featured my father watching races, mostly VHS taped F1 grands prix recorded earlier that morning by my mother. She and I were motorsport fans by association. 

It was the first Wednesday practice session, from 7pm to 9pm. Back then, with a little local knowledge and some name dropping, almost anyone could gain access to trackside through back roads in the forest surrounding most of the circuit. The family friend drove us joyously in his Peugeot 205 down a road that eventually intersected the Mulsanne Straight.

We arrived only minutes before the session started, and just in time for my father to force bright orange ear defenders over my head. But I could still hear the slowly rising sound of an engine racing towards us. The pitch of a turbocharged flat 6 was getting higher and higher, and despite my ridiculous-looking and ill-fitting head gear, was getting louder than anything I'd ever experienced. I was too small to see over the barrier, so I tried to look through a small slit between the metal rails.

That's when it happened. The doppler effect had done its job, and a Porsche 962 roared past me at over 350kph. The percussive force blasted through the gaps in the barrier and knocked me backwards. There's no going back after that first impression.

Honestly, the rest of the race weekend was a blur. The smell of campfires, racing fuel, and beer breath. It was one hell of a way to discover a new country, language, and culture. Vive Le Mans!

The 2016 edition was an emotional weekend like no other - Haydn Cobb

Kazuki Nakajima is helped from the #5 Toyota after failing to finish in the remaining few minutes of the race

Photo by: Gerlach Delissen Photography

The 2016 Le Mans 24 Hours was the first I attended in person as both a spectator and a journalist. And, frankly, it will never be topped.

Of course, the heartbreaking finish that saw the leading Toyota come to a halt on the pitstraight at the start of the final lap was the unforgettable moment – and triggered a hugely stressful and tiring total rewrite of race reports from in the press room – while the Toyota team members breaking down in floods of tears is an image that sticks in the memory.

Years of Le Mans heartache was moments away from being lifted for Toyota, only for defeat to come in the cruellest way, as a fractured airline between one of the turbos and intercooler drained the TS050 of power. Having lost victory, more punishment came in the way of not being classified due to not completing the final lap within six minutes permitted in the rules. First place became second place became no place at all.

However, that year Toyota wasn’t the only team in tears, as before the race Porsche’s head of motorsport Frank Walliser was literally reduced to tears in the team’s press conference over the Balance of Performance for the German manufacturers’ GT operation, with the 911 RSRs so badly hobbled with BoP that it knew it had zero chance to fight Ford and Ferrari. In the macho motorsport world, it showed just how much the race meant to those involved.

Away from grown men crying, the feelgood story came from the Garage 56 entry that enabled Frederic Sausset, a quadruple amputee, to race in a specially-modified Morgan LMP2. It was a feat of engineering and showed the world what was possible with some brilliant solutions and perseverance, as Sausset raced alongside able-bodied co-drivers Christophe Tinseau and Jean-Bernard Bouvet.

There was even the lighter side of Le Mans. In a washed-out night practice the Audi R8 safety car was captured drifting around the Circuit de la Sarthe during a red flag to huge roars of appreciation.

The race is embedded in local culture - Basile Davoine

Mercedes team photo with three Mercedes CLR entries

Photo by: LAT Images via Getty Images

When you’re born in the Sarthe region, just a few miles from Le Mans, the 24 Hours is in your blood. It’s part of your DNA. Like so many children growing up here, I was taken trackside at a very young age. Around Le Mans, it’s more than just a race weekend, it’s part of the local culture. Even people who have no real interest in cars still go to the Le Mans 24 Hours. It’s not simply a tradition; it’s almost a religion.

Beyond the first memories of fuel fumes, hot tyres and barbecues from my childhood, the first edition that truly left a lasting impression on me was 1999. There was already that now-iconic poster inviting fans to witness a line-up packed with legendary manufacturers. And then there was the tension surrounding the Mercedes CLR. A year earlier, those cars had made me dream with their dramatic F1-style start. This time, they would leave me stunned.

I still remember that evening, already well underway, eating sandwiches with my family when the loudspeakers suddenly erupted in disbelief: Peter Dumbreck had gone airborne, and this time everyone had seen it live on television and the giant screens. Even as a child, I realised that motorsport was a constant danger, but also a world of extraordinary adventure.

Fourteen years later, after managing to turn my passion into a job, I covered the 24 Hours for the first time as a journalist. It became a defining experience in every sense, because fate caught up with the race once again and this time death was impossible to ignore. Shortly after the start, Allan Simonsen lost his life. In that single edition of Le Mans, I learned more about my job than in any other: humility, decency, rigorous reporting, and respect for the many human stories contained within the Le Mans 24 Hours.

Because ultimately, that is what this race is about. What makes Le Mans so special? The way it takes hold of you, and the way it creates as many stories as there are men and women involved at every level of the event. Those are the stories we love to tell.

Le Mans has a special buzz no matter what time it is - Teha Courbon

The #83 AF Corse Ferrari crosses the finish line to win the 2025 Le Mans 24 Hours with Kubica at the wheel

Photo by: Marc Fleury

The 2025 Le Mans 24 Hours was my first time working on-site as a journalist. Quite an adventure for a debut, I'll admit. Everyone I told reacted more or less the same way: ‘Oh wow... good luck.’ As if I was heading to the gallows. Very reassuring.

I was so stressed before going. Endurance racing wasn't my main discipline and I'd done my best to catch up, but the Le Mans 24 Hours is intimidating. Even more so when you're about to discover the behind-the-scenes reality of the job for the very first time.

When I arrived at the circuit on the first day, I was incredibly excited, like a child. The paddock and the garages were still empty, it was early, but you could already feel that something was different. An atmosphere that's difficult to describe, as if everyone knew they were about to experience something special.

And that feeling only grew stronger as the days went by.

Throughout the entire week, I had a permanent smile on my face. The passion of the people there seemed to fill the entire circuit, from the media centre above the pitlane all the way to Arnage corner, several kilometres away. Fans, drivers, journalists, team principals, mechanics, even the hospitality staff...everyone seemed to breathe that same passion.

The moment that stayed with me the most, though, was Saturday night. It was four in the morning and I went for a walk through the paddock to watch the cars go by. It felt like one in the afternoon. Hundreds of people were still there, wandering around the village, chatting, living their race as if nighttime simply didn't exist. I even ended up talking to a man near the Dunlop curve in the middle of the night. A completely random conversation that still makes me smile today.

Nothing particularly historic happened that year. Many regulars even told me it was a fairly quiet edition: only one safety car intervention, Ferrari winning in line with its ongoing dominance - even if watching Robert Kubica's triumph unfold was truly something special.

For me, though, that week was incredibly intense. Beyond the race itself, the pace was exhausting, both physically and mentally. I made mistakes, like the rookie I was. And yet, despite that, absolutely everything left an impression on me. For a young fan who had never set foot in a circuit before, it felt like paradise. The sound of the pitstop wheel guns became my own madeleine de Proust. Whenever I hear it again, instantly, I'm back at Le Mans.

It's cliche, but I truly fell in love.

I already loved motorsport - otherwise, what would I be doing here telling you all this? - but that week in Le Mans confirmed something even more important: I was exactly where I was supposed to be. 

Le Mans is the greatest of them all - Kevin Turner

Nothing rivals Le Mans in motorsport

Photo by: Mike Hewitt / Getty Images

Having grown up with a mix of Formula 1 on TV, plus sportscar and historic racing trackside, I’ve had three ‘Oh my goodness’ motorsport moments. One was seeing the Ferraris through Maggotts-Becketts in F1 qualifying at Silverstone, one was first watching (or, more accurately, feeling) Top Fuel dragsters leave the line at Santa Pod, and the other was my first taste of Le Mans.

I’d been a fan of the 24 Hours from afar since childhood, Group C Jaguars, Saubers and Porsches firing my imagination. That era remains one of endurance racing’s greatest, but so does the LMP1 period this century.

My first Le Mans for Autosport was 2008. Venturing trackside for practice was a must, and the ‘wow’ moment came quickly. The sheer speed of the whistling, almost silent Peugeot 908 HDi as it swept through the Dunlop Curve before braking for the chicane was awesome.

A top-level Le Mans car driven by an ace is exciting without wheel-to-wheel action, though the layout of the Circuit de la Sarthe makes overtaking easier there than at most places anyway.

As well as the cars themselves being brilliant, there was the sheer atmosphere at Tertre Rouge in the evening and the incredible build-up during the week. Le Mans is an amazing event even before the race starts.  

That year, of course, was a classic. Audi trio Allan McNish, Tom Kristensen and Rinaldo Capello pulled off their famous steal, beating the faster Peugeots, while Porsche won LMP2, Aston Martin defeated the Chevrolet Corvettes in an epic GT1 contest, and Mika Salo had a good old post-race rant despite winning GT2!

So, what makes Le Mans special? A challenging circuit with fantastic cars, top drivers from around the world and a history full of triumph, drama, heartbreak and more going back over a century. It’s simply the greatest race in the world.

Can the 2026 Le Mans 24 Hours rival 2008 and company?

Photo by: Richard Dole / Motorsport Images