Videos

Toyota didn’t disappoint

Fantastic race! While Toyota’s win was more than expected, the race was thrilling. Though it was (almost) smooth sailing in the Hypercar class, there was a lot of drama throughout the other classes. Culminating with the leader of LMP2 coming in just seven-tenths of a second ahead of second place! Moreover, all five hypercar cars finished the race, so things look very promising for the future.

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.

Model customization at its finest

Frenchman Steph mods and customizes models for a living. I wasn’t aware of his work until I saw him featured at Petrolicious, and it’s nothing short of fantastic. From what I understood he works with all scales, big or small. I’ve been known to mod a model or two, but different than mine, Steph’s model actually looks (VERY!) good 😁.

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 🏁.