There is a lot to admire about the marathon, which tests the limits of human ability. And yet, there is nothing more thrilling than watching Usain Bolt blitz the track in the time it took you to read this paragraph.
Similarly, in motorsports, although nothing matches cars and drivers at their absolute limit, wheel-to-wheel at maddening speeds, endurance racing has undeniable appeal.
While heavy cars and conservative driving, to save fuel and reduce wear and tear, seem an antithesis to the idea of racing, endurance races pose unique challenges.
On Saturday, the French town of Le Mans will come alive for one of the biggest events – the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Alongside the Monaco GP and the Indianapolis 500, the 24-hour endurance race around the 13.8 km Circuit de la Sarthe is part of the triple crown of world motorsports.
The race starts at 3 p.m on a Saturday and ends at 3 p.m. on Sunday, with three drivers sharing duties and racing for more than 5000 km – or the equivalent of 17 F1 Grands Prix.
This weekend is the 85th edition of the race that started back in 1923. Unlike in Formula One, 24 Hours of Le Mans has different cars competing: the LMP or Le Mans Prototypes (cars specifically built for endurance racing) and the GT cars, which are basically production sports-cars. LMP is divided into LMP1 and LMP2, the latter slightly slower. GT cars are divided into GTE Pro and GTE-Am, the latter for amateur drivers.
India will be represented by the country’s second F1 driver, Karun Chandhok, who will compete in the LMP2 category. It will be his fifth attempt at the iconic race.
Speaking about his experience, Chandhok says, “Le Mans is magical, it is the best race in the world in many ways. The challenge of it is that it’s so damn difficult. You’re driving in the day, in the night, the track conditions are changing, the temperatures are changing, you’ve got rain inevitably at some stage.”
Qualifying is held on the Wednesday and Thursday, with the Friday a rest day during which the drivers are taken on a parade around the town.
While the LMP1 cars are the best suited for the race, there have been times when cars from lower classes have won, just by being more reliable over the course of 24 hours. And therein lies one of the challenges for drivers. With cars of varying speeds together on the track, weaving through traffic becomes crucial.
In a column on Mobil 1 The Grid, Chandhok had some interesting stories of the demands drivers face. With an early morning warm-up session, drivers get little shut-eye but for power naps in between. This means the night sessions get gruelling.
“In 2013, I got in the car at 2.30 a.m. and finally got out at 6.20 a.m. after a quadruple stint which I can safely say was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my career.
“The fatigue really sets in. By that point, I’d been awake for nearly 24 hours – apart from a little power-nap – and it’s amazing what an effect that has. You start to see parts of the track that aren’t there, hearing noises that don’t mean anything.
“I remember one year arriving into Indianapolis [corner] at about 4 a.m. in the dark, and there was a wall of smoke. I backed off, thinking an engine had blown up and there may have been oil on the track. But instead of burnt oil, I got the smell of burgers and sausages, as it turned out the smoke was from the local campsite.”
With close to 300,000 fans pouring in for the weekend, it is one of the best-attended motorsport events in the world.
The thing that makes it special is its unpredictability. The duration tests virtually every single part of the car; even a small fault could end in heartbreak. As the 2016 edition showed, a team can dominate the race for 23 hours and 57 minutes, and still end up 45th, as Toyota did, after suffering a mysterious loss of power on the last lap!