2016 Le Mans 24 Hours Only 24 days to go! 24 good reasons to attend

Here are the 24 reasons (in no particular order), which make the 84th event an unforgettable one.

• See 60 cars racing on the track. For the first time in the noughties there will be 60 cars at the start of the Le Mans 24 Hours, a record since the 50s. Thanks to the four new pits built in record time 9 LM P1s, 23 LM P2s, 14 LM GTE Pros, 13 LM GTE Ams and the car in the no. 56 garage will be on the grid on 18th June.

• Catch a glimpse of Brad Pitt, the honorary starter of the 84th event, as he waves the French flag to unleash the 60 cars.

• See if Porsche confirms its 2015 victory. The German manufacturer made its comeback to the blue-riband category in 2014, and took only a year to enjoy a perfect season with a win at Le Mans, and the drivers’ and manufacturers’ titles in the WEC.

• Share your pleasure between endurance and football. You don’t have to choose between the 2016 Euro Football Championship and the Le Mans 24 Hours as all the matches will be shown live in the Le Mans 24-Hours village.

• See the no-holds-barred battle in LM P1 between Porsche, Audi and Toyota which will each enter two cars. After the first two rounds of the FIA World Endurance Championship picking the winner of the 2016 Le Mans 24 Hours is like looking for a needle in a haystack! Especially you will have to beware of private teams, Rebellion Racing and Bykolles Racing Team ;

• See Ford’s return. 60 years after its first victory in the Sarthe, the American manufacturer is making its big comeback in the LM GTE Pro category with four cars.

• See if the Hong Kong team KCMG will keep its title acquired in LM P2 against a horde of highly-motivated challengers determined to oust it from the top spot and claim the trophy.

• Enjoy an exceptional, unbeatable view of the track thanks to the new revamp of the Indianapolis spectator zone. The cars arrive at full speed and have to round a slightly banked corner. Don’t miss this spectacle – above all at nighttime.

• See a French constructor win. While French constructors have virtually no chance of emerging victorious in the overall classification Alpine, Ligier and Oreca are strong contenders for first place in the LM P2 category in which they represent 18 out of the 23 entries.

• Enjoy a full week of entertainment. Starting in the Le Mans town centre, numerous forms of entertainment will be on offer for the spectators between 12- 19 June: scrutineering, Drivers’ Parade, pit and track walks, concerts, autograph sessions without forgetting the Test Day, the general rehearsal on Sunday 5th June.

• Enjoy the intense and always indecisive battle between the five manufacturers in LM GTE Pro: Ferrari, Porsche, Corvette, Aston Martin and Ford.

• Thrill to the sounds of the three big concert evenings on Wednesday 15th, Thursday 16th and Saturday 18th June. Topping the bill are: Shake Shake Go, Julian Perretta, The Shoes and The Avener.

• Cheer on the 32 French drivers at the start. While British drivers lead in terms of numbers with 38, there will be 32 Frenchmen on the grid, five of whom will be gunning for victory: Benoît Tréluyer and Loïc Duval (Audi), Romain Dumas (Porsche), Stéphane Sarrazin (Toyota) and Nicolas Prost (Rebellion).

• Women can come and discover the Women’s Pavilion Year 2. In 2015 it was a great success, and this year the venue entirely devoted to women will reopen its doors with several innovations on its programme.

• Follow the performance of the gentlemen drivers entered for the Le Mans 24 Hours in the LM GTE Am category, in which the hotly-contested fight usually goes down to the wire.

• Dive right into the core of the latest virtual reality technologies thanks to the Virtual Room, which will offer a young, connected public a more real than real plunge into the thick of the race.

• Follow the race from the Club zones reserved for the ACO members, which you can join on the spot. Find the best places to be comfortably installed in the heart of the event or at the trackside and discover the Club’s latest offers (ACO Mobility, ACO Racing Car or Motorbike, ACO Classic and Prestige, as well as ACO 12-15 years old).

• See LM P3s and GT3s locked in battle on the big Sarthe circuit for the first time. The Road to Le Mans race, a curtain-raiser to the Le Mans 24 Hours, will give these two categories the ideal theatre in which to go head-to-head in a new 1-hour event. And there’s also the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli.

• Run into the 2016 Miss 24 Heures / Le Maine Libre. 105 candidates from all over France entered but only one will experience a unique adventure. The winner will be chosen on 4th June in Galeries Lafayette in Le Mans at 17h30.

• Discover talented endurance drivers from Asia. Beside Toyota in LM P1, several teams and drivers come from Asia like Eurasia Motorsport (Philippines), Baxi DC Racing Alpine (China), KCMG (Hong Kong), Team AAI (Taiwan) and Clearwater Racing (Singapore).

• Stroll through the Le Mans 24-Hours village and discover the many boutiques, exhibitions, restaurants with varied menus, stands, and activities for a host of memories.

• Support the two women drivers at the start. Two women will be making their Le Mans 24-Hours debut. 26-year-old Inès Tattinger from France is entered in the Pegasus Racing Morgan in LM P2, and Christina Nielsen from Denmark in LM GTE Am in a Ferrari run by Formula Racing.

• Visit the hotly-anticipated ACO Historic exhibition which, this year, will be devoted to Americans at Le Mans, and get close to no fewer than 15 beautiful American cars that have marked the history of the Le Mans 24 Hours.

• Enjoy a unique experience at the 84th running of the most mythical endurance race in the world, which already has a magical touch about it!

A.C.O.