'Le Mans' In My Head

I have a request of you:

I want you to find a copy of the movie ‘Le Mans’ and watch it start to finish, without interruptions or phone calls or tweeps or Fecesbook updates or any other distractions that could take you away from the storyline. Pause briefly enough only to hit the bathroom or grab a snackie cake and Yoo-Hoo. Turn off your spacephone. The film is only 94 minutes long, so it will be EASY to do. If you're a racing fan and it’s been a while since you’ve seen it, watch it again using these instructions.

Why? Because ‘Le Mans’, starring Steve McQueen at the height of his film career (check out those sideburns!), is perhaps the best movie about motor racing and racing drivers that I have ever seen. The storyline, so subtle as to be almost imperceptible, will prove to be massively satisfying if you pay close attention. This is not (shudder) ‘Talladega Nights’ or ‘Days of Thunder’ or even ‘Grand Prix’, another very fine albeit formulaic joint about racing, sex and death (the vintage race cars and circuits are SPEKTAKOOLAR in ‘Grand Prix’, starring a truly dashing pre-‘Rockford Files’ James Garner).

But ‘Le Mans’ is a different animal altogether. After a recent viewing, I found it to be even more stirring, exciting, brutal and nuanced than I remembered. I want to share with you why it is on my list of Top 20 All-Time Favorite Movies.

Filmed (mostly) in concert with the running of the 1970 event at the Le Sarthe track in France, ‘Le Mans’ was released in June of 1971 after much angst, studio interference, a mid-filming director change and little (if any) publicity by National General Films. My first exposure to it was as a sullen, despondent 15-year-old, trapped in an unexplainable road trip to visit family members in the remote and desolate town of Snowflake, Arizona sometime in late ’71 or early ‘72. We were visiting my Uncle, Aunt and their two young kids, staying with them in their ‘large’ trailer, so my notoriously smelly feet were a subject of much consternation during the few days we visited. Dad made sure to remind me that I was stinkin’ up the joint… repeatedly, each night.

My recollections of Snowflake are minimal, mostly of small houses, a smaller ‘downtown’, dirt roads and eating a burger that was bigger than the plate it was served on when we went out for dinner one night. The thing that truly stands out, that rivets me to that dusty burg in the middle of a dusty state, was that the new movie ‘Le Mans’ was showing at the tiny theater in town. I knew nothing of the film, but one evening we walked down the dirt street to the tiny old theater, bought some popcorn and cokes and sat down to watch a film that would literally FLOOR ME. I had no idea this would become a lasting love affair with such a small but important film.

The plot is simple: the film follows several drivers and their teams during the classic 24-hour race that starts at 4PM on Saturday and ends at 4PM on Sunday. Except for the PA announcer reviewing the Porsche vs. Ferrari battle, the impending weather and details about how the race will be run, there is literally NO DIALOG for the first 35 minutes. Composer Michel Legrand's glorious soundtrack is vintage ‘70’s, but it still works and perfectly suits the film's style and pacing. Steve McQueen portrays Porsche driver Michael Delaney, returning to the track where he'd crashed heavily the year before. Steve’s mannerisms, his look, his tightly-held emotional collar and classic tight-assed pit walk (copied by every budding race driver ever since, I swear!) all embody the very essence of what we (me) wanted race drivers to be.

About that first 35 minutes… if you aren’t paying close attention, you will absolutely MISS the extremely subtle developments that delineate the plot and storyline and keep resurfacing in-between the amazing road-racing action. I won’t detail anything from the film’s opening because DAMMIT, you gotta earn this one. Even though Steve once famously stated “there’s no phony love story in this film”, there is indeed a really interesting relationship he develops, slotted among several others throughout the story’s arc. Check out this first clip from the film, and wallow in the glorious sound of those sexy, fast, beautifully manic cars (Michael Delaney is driving Blue Gulf Porsche #20):



Now is when the meaty storyline elements begin to surface… slowly, languidly, an excellent counterpoint to the raging cars pounding around the track. As the race progresses, you learn more about Michael Delaney, his Ferrari rival Erich Stahler (Siegfried Rauch), race widow Maria Belgetti (Elga Andersen), the enjoined battle between Ferrari and Porsche, and the war every team is waging against this most daunting of racetracks. After numerous viewings, I finally figured out the flow and tempo that immediately brings the story to life: YOU GOTTA PAY ATTENTION. Like I said before, this ain’t The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.

Sometime during the early morning hours of the second day, a sequence of events lead to a devastating accident, a moment’s distraction and subsequent massive ‘shunt’ that takes out Delaney’s Porsche, leaving it a shattered, steaming heap next to the Armco barrier. He sits in the car, stunned, shivering, recalling each millisecond of time to the moment he crashed… HARD. Every time I watch this part of the movie, I feel the crash, hear the shredding metal, smell the hot fluids spewing all over the car’s interior, taste the bloody lip. Another year, another crash, his car is demolished, his dream of winning Le Mans is snatched away. Every driver’s nightmare, come to me NOW.

He’s taken to the trackside medical center, where he encounters Maria Belgetti, who is once-again a spectating victim of how cruel racing can be. As he exits the center, he sees her besieged by the paparazzi and rescues her from their gaping maw, leading her to a taxi that whisks her away. He then heads back to the hot pits to face up to his team owner David Townsend, who sees him from trackside and walks over:

DT: (looks Delaney up and down) “Michael… are you all right?”

MD: “Yeah, I’m fine.”

DT: "Are you sure?"

MD: "I'm OK."

DT: (pauses for a moment, then looks at him squarely) “Then what about the car?”

MD: (pauses, looks pained, then speaks) “It was my fault, David. (pause) I made a mistake. I wrote the car off.”

DT: (a moment of disbelief is seen in his eyes, then resignation. Before he can speak, someone from the pit calls him and he leaves)

Simple dialog, few words, POWERFUL unspoken emotions that are evident if you're closely watching the nuanced performances of Steve McQueen and Ronald Leigh-Hunt. Just like the following clips that show Delaney walking from the pits after this exchange… I wasn’t able to find the whole segment, so play the clips in sequence to watch the full scene:





The film’s entire dénouement, including the hard truth of motor racing, is encapsulated in the trailer scene. Maria Belgetti is scarred from her love of the sport, and yet… she still loves it, still needs it. Delaney’s facial expressions when they enter the trailer are priceless, showing McQueen as a master of the understatement, his eyes and eyebrows and mouth and body speaking without words. She asks some hard questions, and he responds: “Racing's important to men who do it well. When you're racing, it's... it's life. Anything that happens before or after… is just waiting.” Right away he knows his words spear her, because she has a realization about her own life, an epiphany, and you can see it in her eyes, without the need for her to speak. This is really spare, sharp screenwriting, letting the actors emote in a seemingly effortless fashion.

Can you tell that I am enamored with this movie? DAMN, I love a movie that makes me work for the goodie!

As in real-world motor racing, everything changes when the two leading cars experience mechanical woes and are stalled in the pits for lengthy repairs near the end of the race. Ferrari takes the lead and Porsche team owner Townsend decides that the driver in one of his remaining cars isn’t fit enough to challenge, so Delaney is tapped to replace him. As they walk back to the track, Townsend tells Delaney: "Michael, I want you to drive flat out. I want Porsche to win Le Mans." This scene of the final two laps of the race brings me so close to the action, I can smell the oil and rubber and exhaust and feel the driver’s determination (this clip is compressed for some reason but is still AWESOME):



ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?! The cars are alive… filthy, frenzied, speeding beasts in mortal combat with each other. The film's interpretation of the ‘red mist’ of racing at 10/10ths is intoxicating, because NOTHING can compare to the power and craziness of competition at this level. All the sweat and blood and toil and trouble to push the leading Ferrari to the finish line is dashed by a flat tire, the disappointment and loss obvious on the faces of the car’s driver and team manager. THIS STUFF REALLY HAPPENS. The look of determination on Delaney’s face as he pushes his own car to battle with Stahler is REAL, his eyes doing all the talking. The Red and Blue cars thrust and parry, slam and bang and slice and slither their way across the track, clawing for traction and speed. I especially love the race-geek camera work, with no freaking CGI or animation to screw things up. The way the cars nose-dive and squirm as they scrub speed to take a hard turn is awesome. A mechanical ballet, where life's contrast knob is set to 11 and disaster is always just one corner away.

I like to tell non-racing fans that among the myriad reasons I love almost all forms of motorsports, one of the most important is the SCIENCE of it all. Physics on display. Combustion, momentum, friction, chemistry, aerodynamics, geometry, gravity, hydraulics, metallurgy, electromagnetics, calculus… racing embodies all of these disciplines. Add the fact that this film, shot in 1970 with what is now considered archaic and antiquated movie-making technology, so perfectly demonstrates both the physical AND emotional realities of high-caliber motor racing, the human and mechanical… it stuns me to this day.

Most of 'Le Mans' was shot during the actual 1970 race, and real drivers drove real cars really fast during race shooting and additional footage, among them Jo Siffert, Brian Redman, Vic Elford, Kurt Ahrens Jr., Herbert Linge and Jonathan Williams. Driver David Piper was involved in a crash during shooting and lost part of his lower leg (the film is dedicated to him in the closing credits). A Porsche 908/2 that McQueen had previously co-driven to a Second-Place finish in the 12 Hours of Sebring was entered into the race to compete, laden with heavy film gear to provide actual footage of the racing action. Although not classified as a finisher for not completing the minimum laps due to stops to change the film reels, it still managed to finish 2nd in the P3.0 class.

Steve McQueen was a real race car driver.

I always come back to the actors, the screenplay and the unspoken emotions that are spread throughout this film. That’s where the storyline shines, where words don’t matter but the emotion and how emotion is conveyed does. This was Steve McQueen’s vanity project, and it cost him his marriage, boatloads of money and a lot of personal capital that took years to recoup. It was also a disappointment at the box office, but time and history have given this film the respect it deserves, now considered one of only a very few racing films that can honestly be viewed as true-to-life.

Are you ready to take on this challenge? Are you capable of turning off your spacephone for 94 minutes… IN A ROW?!?!?! I guarantee that if you view this film in its entirety, pay attention to the spoken and unspoken words, watch the nuances of emotional interaction among these fine actors, you will be rewarded with a sense of completion at the film’s end that will make you smile broadly, glad to have made the effort. And, if my hunch is right, you will become a fan of 'Le Mans'. If you are already a fan of the film, see it again and (if you're like me), pretend to be Michael Delaney during those last two laps of driving flat-out in the 1970 French countryside. Full-screen zoom, volume up, eyes wide open.

It's not just a film about racing, it's a film about people who race and why they do it, and what it does to them. It's about the human condition, about why we push, no matter what the risk, in order to feel like we've achieved something bigger than ourselves. The risks are great at the sharp-end of motor racing, but the same desire for life is no less vital to any loving, feeling individual, yearning to touch the white-hot center of their short existence on this spinning Blue rock, speeding through the vacuum of time and space.



Lead image, muchismas gracias de theselvedgeyard.wordpress.com; all video clips, muchismas gracias de youtube.com; historical references, muchismas gracias de wikipedia.com. Viva Steve McQueen!

NASCAR Is Not Evil

A great quote often attributed to Ernest Hemingway goes like this: "There are only three true sports – bullfighting, deep-sea fishing, and motor racing. Everything else is just a game."

I am a motorsports fan. I love almost every form of two- and four-wheeled racing, with the notable exception of motocross, which bores me to tears. Road racing is my passion… open-wheel formula and closed-wheel sports cars make my eyes spin just watching them slice from apex to apex, exhaust blasting and dust flying and bits of exotic rubber shredding off at every corner. I’ve been fortunate to spend time at the wheel of many different types of road and race cars during track days, autocrosses, off-road tours and racing driver schools. Driving a race car on-track is third on the list of things I enjoy most during my life’s waking hours.

That’s why I wince whenever another racing fan disparages NASCAR as not being ‘real' racing. It’s a very common feeling among fans who believe their series is far superior than anyone else’s, and nowhere is that divide more pronounced than between the road racers and the oval racers. Think the Farmers and the Cowmen. The Skiers and the Snowboarders. The Hatfields and The McCoys. The Conservatives and the Liberals. You know… a simmering resentment that borders on (and sometimes turns into) open hostility. Thankfully, there are some of us who look at all racing disciplines (including motocross) as a uniquely vibrant symbiosis of man, machine, science, chance and luck.

NASCAR racing, and the premier Sprint Cup Series in particular, is a singular example of that symbiosis… professional racing that has been cooked down to its most brutal and elemental format. There are many people, including hard-core race fans, who don’t seem to grasp the nature of classic oval racing that is central to NASCAR’s existence and popularity. “All they do is go fast in a circle for hours and hours” is the most common criticism of the genre, which is woefully uninformed about the incredible effort it takes to go fast in a circle, sometimes for hours. A bit of understanding goes a long way towards gaining an appreciation for the sport. Let me help.

The most popular lore about NASCAR’s history refers to mid-20th century Southern moonshiners in their souped-up cars outrunning the revenooers while trying to deliver their cargo of White Lightnin'. While this historical episode is absolutely true, the oval racing phenomenon has its roots much, much further back… back to horse races at 19th century American county fairs, to the bareback match races in dusty Arabic town squares, to the chariot races and nascent Olympic stadium foot races in ancient Rome and Greece. Yep, it goes that far back, and the connection is not just passive. Men have competed in the oval format, with and without their mounts, for millennia. It is human nature to test ourselves against each other in a closed-course environment while spectators cheer and drink and gamble and fight and puke and enjoy the spectacle.



A modern top-echelon Sprint Cup racing machine is NOT a 'stock' car, even though NASCAR stands for ‘National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing’. The name harkens back to 1949 when the organization was formed and they really did race cars that were essentially stock or barely modified for competition. In them days, the racers also had guns and knives and fistfights in the pits so the they could handle on-track disagreements, and they were lucky to win enough prize money to pay for their race expenses, especially if a car got wadded-up. These days, like all other mainline professional sports, it’s all about The Benjamins for the mega-bucks multi-car teams with expensive equipment and personnel and rigs and sponsors that demand free tickets and team clothing and fresh flowers on each hospitality center table while they dine on gourmet food.

Today’s Sprint Cup race car is a purpose-built, handcrafted, tube-framed, metal-clad, mega-horsepowered speed device that owes its existence to science, technology, human endeavor and sheer madness. The cars are an exercise in building a machine to stringent technical specifications which allows them to reach speeds in excess of 200mph while competing with 42 other cars on the track at the same time. Depending on which track they're at, their engines can produce as much as 800 horsepower. Their eggshell-thin sheet metal bodies are formed and tweaked and massaged to reduce drag, increase downforce and promote aerodynamic efficiency. The chassis is fabricated from thick-wall metal tubing that can withstand a crash where an impact can measure to 100 times the power of gravity, or 100G’s, all while protecting the flesh/blood/bone driver strapped inside.

Once the cars are inspected to ensure they meet the technical and safety specifications, the driver proceeds to lap the track as fast as the laws of physics will allow. The science involved is the part that has me so enamored with racing in general. Combustion. Torque. Friction. Gravity. Geometry. Inertia. Momentum. Aerodynamics. Thrust. Thermal expansion. Deterioration. Turbulence. Calculus. Metallurgy. Chemistry. The mind reels at the complexity involved in order to ‘go fast in a circle, sometimes for hours’. My years working in the performance tire industry taught me about how tenuous the connection is between the tire and track surface at the limits of adhesion. The tire tread surface literally melts when it contacts the ground at speed, morphing into a gooey patch that just barely maintains friction, keeping the car moving forward but almost losing the safety of friction-based traction. SCIENCE, BABY.



Another distinction of the Sprint Cup Series: these are endurance races, as opposed to a shorter ‘sprint’ races. Most of the oval races are 400 or 500 miles long, with a 600-miler run at Charlotte (NC) each year on Memorial Day weekend. The smaller ovals usually run lap counts as opposed to miles due to their slower average lap speeds (100mph is slow?), but the challenges are no less daunting. This format is unique to NASCAR, as the US-based open-wheel and sports car series run only a few high-mileage endurance events each year.

The endurance nature of the NASCAR events are where the real racing challenge happens. Visualize this: 43 cars and their teams have qualified for a race, and they all compete at maximum speed on the track at the same time, requiring multiple pit-stops for new tires and fuel… FOR 500 MILES. Each lap is another opportunity to mess up and crash or get spun out. Each pit stop is another opportunity to get it wrong, drop the car off the jacks before the tires have been mounted, stop in the wrong pit (yes, it happens), drive into or out of the pits too fast, run over a tire or air hose or some other infraction and incur a penalty. And always... always, there is the chance for mechanical failure. There are myriad ways a race can go into the dumper, and it all happens while the race is progressing at high speed.

The ever-present danger that accompanies NASCAR competition brings with it an edge that fans and spectators are hesitant to admit is like a narcotic. While it’s been almost a decade since the last spate of crash-related deaths in the series, the chance for a horrific accident is always there, waiting to snatch the life of an unlucky driver while everyone watches. Having witnessed life-ending race crashes in person, I can speak from personal experience – it changes you.

Remember the comparison I made earlier to the chariot races in Rome? Modern technology has made the racing vastly safer than even 10 years ago, but like Steve McQueen’s character, race driver Michael Delaney, said in the classic movie ‘Le Mans’: “Auto racing is a professional blood sport. It can happen to you. Then it can happen again” When asked why men race and risk death, he responds, “Racing is important to men who do it well. Racing is life. Everything before and after… is just waiting.”





On the negative side of the typical NASCAR Sprint Cup extravaganza, there is a real over-the-top true-blue American carnival atmosphere to the events, and the entertainment aspect has begun to make it seem just a wee-bit saccharine, a tad contrived, a little overly-patriotic. Most of the drivers now have to be clean-cut corporate shills, always remembering to name-check their sponsors while on camera, have cookie-cutter cute blonde wives, love God and country and bow their heads in prayer during the pre-race invocation. Gone are the rough-and-tumble types that built the sport from a strictly regional series. The sanctioning body also has a reputation for meddling with qualifying results and making questionable calls during the races. Yes, sometimes the races can be boring if one team hits the right set-up and runs away from the field, stinking up the joint. All that is true, but overall, it's still the real deal.

The TV broadcasts are another matter. Sometimes the commercialism involved with the sport can be overbearing, with sponsor logos on absolutely everything. In fact, there are times that the racing action is limited to only half of the screen, with the rest taken over by the running order scroll, banner ads, several screen 'bugs' and at least three different sponsor logos. A recent development has the race in a small screen portal with no sound while the commercials are rolling, mostly ads with the drivers hawking everything from auto parts to furniture rental to boner pills. Sometimes we'll record the race and watch it later that day or the next, speeding through the commercials and turning a 3-1/2 hour broadcast into a much more viewable 2 hours. I'm not the type to go bonkers if I find out who won before I watch the damned thing... at least not all the time.

As I write this essay, the 2011 Daytona 500 is only hours away and, thanks to a newly-repaved track surface, race official's meddling and last-minute changes to the cars, it seems as if there will be a very odd type of race, where two cars can 'pair-up' nose-to-tail and run almost 10mph faster than the field. The practice and warm-up races have yielded an unfortunate race strategy, so it remains to be seen what will happen on Race Day. Oh, I'll watch it all right, even though I have a sinking feeling the race will wind up with a bunch of paired-up cars drafting around the track, all keeping their distance from each other so they can make it to the last few laps and then shoot it out for the Checkered Flag.

That's what happens sometimes. I've also seen boring football and baseball games, but methinks even if the Daytona 500 is less than stellar, the next race will see the competition get back to normal.

NASCAR racing is not evil, is not dumb, does not ask the fan to think too hard, but offers limitless opportunities to revel in the classic American sport of stock car racing. Yes, they race at high speed in a circle for hours, but when you have a better understanding of the challenges involved, it creates a drama and excitement that few other sports can equal. Make it a point to give NASCAR racing some of your valuable time, and remember the incredible amount of science involved, the sheer courage required, the risk of death and the reward of finishing First. It might... just... snare you. You're welcome!

UPDATE: As I suspected, the 2011 Daytona 500 turned into a race dominated by two-car drafting pairs, which were able to lap faster than individual cars or an entire pack of them. The drivers were allowed to communicate with each other via their on-board radios so they could set up their strategic pairings while whizzing along at 195mph. Although I was disappointed at this turn of events, the race was really exciting and yielded a surprise winner: 20 year-old Trevor Bahne, racing in only his second Sprint Cup race. Driving the Wood Brothers #21 Ford, Trevor was fast all day, drafted like a champ and held off several veterans to capture NASCAR's crown jewel. It was the first win in 10 years for the Wood Brothers team, who last won the 500 in 1979.

I am not a fan of this new type of 'drafting pair' speedway racing, yet I know it will happen again the next time they visit Daytona in July and during both upcoming races at my beloved Talladega (boo hoo). I reckon I'm old skool in many ways. I figger that every car is out there to beat every other car. When drivers can work together to gain an advantage, whether they're on the same team or not, well... that just doesn't seem to be in the spirit of ANY type of motor racing. The reviews on the race were mixed. I dinna like it. Oh well... that's racing!

'Thunder Road' trailer, Michael Waltrip In-Car Camera clip, 'Ben Hur' clip and 'Daytona 2009 Finish' clip all MUCHISMAS GRACIAS de youtube.com. Talladega image courtesy of markjbelis.com.

The More Things Change...

For the 2010 Formula One racing season, we once again have the pleasure to watch ace piloto Michael Schumacher strap in and hold on for all he's worth at the wheel of the Mercedes (formerly Brawn) factory sled. He's taking a lot of flack for his decision to come back after a 3-year 'forced' retirement, and even more because he hasn't yet won a race. To his critics, I say: STFU.

The 7-time World Driver's Champion was pushed out of the Ferrari team to make room for Kimi Raikkonen, who promptly won a single title and then spent the next two years on cruise control, ultimately leaving the sport to go... rallying?!?! And now, the Scuderia has drawn in the brilliant but scummy Fernando Alonso to make things right, with teammate Felipe Massa now on the outs and likely to be pushed out at season's end as well.

But Mikey... he wasn't finished, not yet. Sure, he broke his neck racing a Moto GP bike and learned there ARE limits to adhesion, but he knew, deep down in his Teutonic soul, that F1 still had things that needed to be done by hissownself. Besides, his big-time racing career started with the Mercedes sports car team, so why not make this final effort on behalf of the Silver Arrows that gave him his first real break?

Yes, I'm a major fan of his, have been ever since his first rainy race day at Spa in the lovely Green Jordan. Yes, he spun out and drew his first DNF that day, but his talent was never questioned, and he made things go HUGE at Benetton Renault before his stellar run at Ferrari. He developed a reputation as a brutally calculating driver with sharp racecraft and an eye for the occasional cheap shot, but so what? Results, baby... that's what makes the F1 circus so much fun to watch and enjoy!

His marriage? Questionable at best. His mentoring of the fast-but-erratic teammate Nico Rosberg? Priceless. His ability to make a good-but-not-great car jump thru hoops? Obvious.

Sooo... now we just watch and wait. He might find the cars are just too far removed from his comfort zone... the competition just too tough... the F1 circus no longer to his liking. All may be true, but for me, the situation is just too juicy to ignore, and I look forward to his first podium of the season and (dare I say it?), his first opportunity to take the checkers, spray the bubbly and leap into the air, fist-pumping like the racing animal he has always been.

Or not.