Just wondered what Le Mans cars – I'm talking about Les 24 heures du Mans , to be specific – was used for for the rest of the year during the pre-World War 2 period. Le Mans type cars raced at Spa-Francorchamps which hosted a semi-annual 24 hour race during this period and the Targa Florio converted to ”sports cars” during this time too.
A lot of these cars carried license plates, so were they every day commuting vehichles or was there other races that catered for production based cars around the world? Was the marketing potential big enough to argument for spending money on one or a few races every year. Considering that Le Mans and Targa Florio are at opposite ends track wise, I even think there would have been few doing both races with the same car.
Jesper
Le Mans cars ? the rest of the year
Started by
Jesper O. Hansen
, Apr 16 2011 09:51
2 replies to this topic
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#2
Bjorn Kjer
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Posted 16 April 2011 - 10:19
http://www.kolumbus....nellman/spo.htm
Mojn Jesper , the above link has a results chapter on sports car racing , might help you a bit . My little book The LM 24 hour race by D.Hodges has results and several pictures to see if you are interested.
Mojn Jesper , the above link has a results chapter on sports car racing , might help you a bit . My little book The LM 24 hour race by D.Hodges has results and several pictures to see if you are interested.
#3
Vitesse2
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Posted 16 April 2011 - 11:08
I think there are probably as many answers as cars, Jesper, but a lot of them were most likely used in other events in their home countries - races, trials, rallies or hillclimbs. The rallying and trialling use would be just one reason for road registration.
Sports car racing was rather fragmented in the 1930s, because there was no international agreement on a standard formula. The big races of the time - Le Mans, Targa Florio, Spa, Targa Abruzzo, Mille Miglia, Tourist Trophy etc - each issued their own regulations, so a car which was eligible for one of them might not be able to race in another. Those regulations could and would change from year to year as well and in many cases it was possible just to put cycle wings and (perhaps) other road equipment on a pure racing car and call it a sports car! This was really the situation up to 1935, but then it started to change.
The French were the first to come up with a really coherent set of sports car rules when they temporarily withdrew from Grand Prix racing in 1936-37, but even these were quite easy to get round and thinly-disguised GP Bugattis were soon being used. On the other hand, some of the cars which raced also turned up in rallies! At the same time, both Italy and Germany were formulating their own national regulations, which were applied to races and hillclimbs.
It is also not generally realised that the 1938-40 International Formula included sports car regulations but very few races were held using these, mainly in the Low Countries, and I can only think of three or four cars which were designed specifically with them in mind.
This link to Martin Krejci's site will give some idea, but you should also look at the pages for British, German and Italian national races, where you'll find cars which had run at La Sarthe in quite minor events:
http://wsrp.ic.cz/prewar.html
Sports car racing was rather fragmented in the 1930s, because there was no international agreement on a standard formula. The big races of the time - Le Mans, Targa Florio, Spa, Targa Abruzzo, Mille Miglia, Tourist Trophy etc - each issued their own regulations, so a car which was eligible for one of them might not be able to race in another. Those regulations could and would change from year to year as well and in many cases it was possible just to put cycle wings and (perhaps) other road equipment on a pure racing car and call it a sports car! This was really the situation up to 1935, but then it started to change.
The French were the first to come up with a really coherent set of sports car rules when they temporarily withdrew from Grand Prix racing in 1936-37, but even these were quite easy to get round and thinly-disguised GP Bugattis were soon being used. On the other hand, some of the cars which raced also turned up in rallies! At the same time, both Italy and Germany were formulating their own national regulations, which were applied to races and hillclimbs.
It is also not generally realised that the 1938-40 International Formula included sports car regulations but very few races were held using these, mainly in the Low Countries, and I can only think of three or four cars which were designed specifically with them in mind.
This link to Martin Krejci's site will give some idea, but you should also look at the pages for British, German and Italian national races, where you'll find cars which had run at La Sarthe in quite minor events:
http://wsrp.ic.cz/prewar.html
