A Tour of Le Mans 1956

[al mcguire]

Driver Mike Hawthorn, with a camera on the tail of his Jaguar D-type and a microphone slung over his shoulders, narrates a pre-race practice lap around the Circuit de la Sarthe. It’s a rare chance to ride along, to see and hear one of Jaguar’s most legendary racing machines in the venue where it so thoroughly dominated the competition.

 

 

 

[Jeff Wexler]

I loved this! Technical quality is not at all what we've become accustomed to now but still a wonderful piece, images and sound, and an amazing race track. I am posting the description from Wikipedia for those who are not familiar with this famous racetrack.

The Circuit des 24 Heures, also known as Circuit de la Sarthe,[1] located in Le Mans, Maine, France, is a semi-permanent race course most famous as the venue for the 24 Hours of Le Mans auto race. The track uses local roads that remain open to the public most of the year. The circuit, in its present configuration, is 13.629 kilometres (8.47 mi) long, making it one of the longest circuits in the world. Capacity of the race stadium is 100,000.

Le Mans is a race where up to 85% of the time is spent on full throttle, meaning immense stress on engine and drivetrain components. However, the times spent reaching maximum speed also mean tremendous wear on the brakes and suspension as cars must slow from over 200 mph (320 km/h) to around 65 mph (100 km/h) for the end of Mulsanne in a short distance. Downforce in the era of Group C cars helped braking to some degree but presently cars are tending towards low downforce to seek higher speeds in the face of power limiting regulations.

[al mcguire]

Here is the 1955 Race news footage

 

and the forensics of the accident

 

 

[pverrando]

That Coles microphone does a great job in this application. They are still making those mics! The current model is the 4104.

[chriskellett]

An interesting reminder on of the informality of racing in the 50's.  Thanks Al.

 

 

[Malcolm Davies Amps CAS]

That Coles microphone does a great job in this application. They are still making those mics! The current model is the 4104.

All the fx tracks of the cars in the film Grand Prix were recorded using this mic. At the time it was the only mic that would handle the sound levels. Peter Sutton (RIP) was the recordist responsible for these tracks.