A few weeks ago (October 4th) FIAWEC posted on their YouTube page an almost hour-long recap of the 2021 24 Heures du Mans. And dummy here only found it this morning 😣. Better late than never, I guess.
I am going to watch it tonight, on a big screen TV.
Category: Film
Peugeot 9X8
Today Peugeot officially revealed their new hypercar, the 9X8. The French manufacturer didn’t offer much in terms of specs, however the new 9X8 will be hybrid. The rear wheels are powered by a 2.6-liter V6, with 680 hp (500 kW), while the front wheels will be powered by a 200 kW electric motor. Perhaps the most striking characteristic of the new car is that it doesn’t have a rear wing (!). Hopefully we will see the new beast at La Sarthe in 2022.
1953 Le Mans: brandy and a broken windscreen
Just a few days after I found that 1953 film, I stumbled upon this one. Keep in mind that this story was never officially confirmed. However, I don’t have much difficulty in believing it 😅😅😅.
1953 Le Mans
First time I see a more “personal” view of a Le Mans race. From 1953, with color and black & white footage.
Le Mans + Nürburgring
Last year, around April when this bloody pandemic was becoming serious for us here, I found this video on Porsche’s YouTube channel. It seemed to be pretty good, so I downloaded it to watch on a big screen. I saved the file to my “Race Videos” directory and then, well, totally forgot about it 😣. Yesterday I was going over my hard drive and found it among other saved files. I ended watching it on the laptop and yes, it is awesome. And should be seen on a big screen.
In a nutshell, it’s 91 minutes on Porsche’s effort in GT racing at the 2019 Le Mans and 24 Hours of Nürburgring. Specially interesting for the Porsche fan boy however good enough for all endurance racing fans.
Richard Seaman – Britain’s forgotten ace pilot
Richard John Beattie-Seaman was more than probably England’s best racing driver of the 1930s. Despite that, his name is relegated to footnotes in history books. This 47 minute-long video by the Discovery Channel tells his story. A little bit over-dramatic at parts, and also not 100% historically factual, however a thoroughly delightful film. I really enjoyed seeing actual Golden Era race footage, specially of the 1937 Avusrennen.
All in all a very interesting window to the Silberpfeile and the Golden Era of GP racing.
The 90s’ Dream Cars
McLaren F1, Porsche GT1 and Mercedes CLK-GTR. I doubt anyone will disagree that those three cars are all dream cars. I would go as far as saying that they were THE best supercars of the 1990s. Carfection made a very interesting piece about them, divided in three parts. The first part (McLaren F1) came out on May 17th, the second part (Porsche GT1) on May 19th and the third (CLK-GTR) yesterday. From the first video above you will see links to the subsequent parts.
What make these three cars so great in my eyes is one very pertinent characteristic – race legacy. All three raced at La Sarthe and all three were winners, though the CLK-GTR elsewhere. With that, the three videos sum up 41 minutes of pure gearhead bliss 🏁.
Legendary Porsches
Welt just released the full version (in HD!) of their “Legendary Porsches” documentary. It’s a full hour about many of Stuttgart’s most iconic cars, with interviews and vintage race footage. With all that, I would say it’s a VERY well spent hour in front of the computer. In fact, it’s so good that I’m downloading it to have it in my video library.
The really first Silberpfeil
In January last year Jay Leno released a very interesting episode in his “Jay Leno’s Garage”. I talked about this car in the second part of my Silver Arrows series last month. This is the replica of the original 1932 Silberpfeil that Mercedes Benz built in 2019, and Jay Leno made a fantastic 28 minutes video about it. In this video was the first time I heard Mercedes admit that it wasn’t Alfred Neubauer who originally coined the term.
Historical origins aside, as usual, Leno produced a fantastic video that’s really worth the watch.
The coming of the disk brake
Just a few minutes ago, going through my YouTube page I found this gem, and had to share it. From what I understood, this short film was filmed in 2012, but released in late 2020. Just 32 minutes, but to hear Stirling Moss reminiscing about those “poetic times” was absolutely fantastic. And it’s not just Stirling Moss, but Norman Dewis as well. A true legend when it comes to Jaguar, he talks about how he got involved with the Jaguar C-Type and his almost victory (together with Moss) at the 1952 Mille Miglia.
The film doesn’t show much technical details about the project’s development, however the participation of Jackie Stewart, Martin Brundle and Derek Bell make these 32 minutes totally delightful.