Brian Redman

Great Britain’s Brian Redman is unquestionably one of the greatest drivers of his generation. The former Porsche factory driver continues his sit down with Tony Mcguiness as we look back at Brian’s remarkable life and career during one of the most dangerous eras in racing

Le Mans… it is painful and bothers me to this day to know that the 24 Hours of Le Mans is the only major world championship sports car race I never won. Talking about my 14 Le Mans attempts and writing about it in my book Daring Drivers and Deadly Tracks, still wounds my pride. Every Le Mans without a win was crushing, but there were five particularly heart-breaking times I led Le Mans overall.

My first drive at Le Mans took place at the 1967 race. I was invited to drive a GT40 belonging to Viscount Downe (John Dawnay), but entered by John Wyer who, with John Willment, had just formed JW Automotive Engineering to take over Ford Advanced Vehicles (the ‘JW’ initials in the company name actually stood for John Willment, not John Wyer).

In the 1967 race at Le Mans, my co-driver was the well-known British privateer Mike Salmon. When after 20 laps Mike came in for fuel, I opened up the door and was ready to get in and go. He looked up at me and said, “I’m terribly comfortable, old boy. I’m staying in.” He was the senior driver, so it was his right to remain in place.

After every refuelling stop, it was the responsibility of the Automobile Club de l’ouest’s official Plombeur to secure the snap action filler cap with a lead seal to prevent someone later topping up the tank. However, he hadn’t fastened the seal properly. At the end of the Mulsanne Straight, at about 200mph, Mike put the brakes on, causing fuel to surge forward from the tank, popping open the cap and flowing onto the hot exhaust pipes.

The GT40 exploded into flames. Mike managed to get himself out of the car but was badly burned. Fortunately, he survived. It wasn’t lost on me that if Mike had not insisted on continuing to drive, it would have been me driving in the car, and me in the hospital with severe burns.

During practice at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1969, my co-driver Jo Siffert and I had tried one of the new 917s. On the Mulsanne Straight, the 917 became absolutely terrifying. Cars with unresolved aerodynamics tend to wander at high speeds, also known in racing terms as ‘hunting’. At 200mph a hunting car is beyond alarming.

Jo and I lobbied for and got permission to drive a special, new long-tail 908/02 Flunder. We were leading the race when at about 8:00pm the gearbox overheated, melting the plastic pipe that normally got cooling air. Because of the new long-tail, not enough cooling was taking place. The enclosed tail section made the ducts in the rear bodywork inefficient. That was Jo and I out of the 24 Hours of Le Mans for 1969.

In 1970 the 917 aerodynamics had been sorted out and proven. Porsche had seven 917s in its arsenal. Two of them were long-tails especially designed for Le Mans and the other five were short-tail 917Ks. John Wyer decided to run short-tail 917Ks rather than any new Porsche-supplied long-tails. Jo Siffert with me, and Pedro Rodriguez and Leo Kinnunen were given the upgraded 4.9-litre engines.

Porsche Salzburg provided Vic Elford and Kurt Ahrens the new 917LH long-tail version. Hans Herrmann and Richard Attwood would pilot the #23 red and white Salzburg short-tail 917K. Also entered was the other 917LH long-tail in the Martini Hippie livery driven by Gerard Larrousse and Willi Kauhsen.

At the 1970 race, things started to go awry alarmingly quickly for Porsche. Our team’s Rodriguez and Kinnunen car was the first to retire after 22 laps with a broken connecting rod. Only 27 laps later John Wyer’s Hailwood/hobbs entry was out after Mike Hailwood slid his 917 into a stalled Alfa Romeo. Mike had failed to stop when called in for rain tyres.

As rain began to fall in the early evening, trouble was brewing for Ferrari in their 512s; Reine Wisell couldn’t see through his oil-streaked windscreen and had slowed on the side of the road driving through Maison Blanche as he headed for the pits.

Suddenly three factory 512s arrived at high speed nose to tail. Derek Bell in the first Ferrari swerved to miss the 512, however in doing so, he selected the wrong gear and blew the engine. Clay Regazzoni in his Ferrari didn’t miss and smashed into Wisell, followed by Michael Parkes. In one fell swoop, four top-rated Ferraris were out of the race. This left Jacky Ickx (future Porsche driver) as the one serious Ferrari contender still in the race.

Along with Jacky, rivals Porsche Salzburg with Vic Elford/kurt Ahrens in the #25 white/red Salzburg long-tail, and Hans Herrmann/richard Attwood in the #23 red/white Salzburg short-tail, were now the main threats to JW Gulf’s Siffert and Redman.

As the rain became torrential into the evening, Jacky Ickx in his 512 clawed his way back into the race and was up to 2nd place by midnight. He had caught up to Jo Siffert in our 917. Now they were racing. About 1:45am Ickx’s epic charge came to a tragic end. He was trying to unlap himself from Siffert when the Ferrari’s rear brakes failed approaching the Ford Chicane. Ickx went off the track and crashed into a sandbank. The car was launched over the bank and burst into flames, unfortunately killing a track marshal. Ickx himself was relatively uninjured. With all Ferrari works 512s out, the Ferrari challenge to Porsche was effectively over.

Seppi and me now had a comfortable five-lap lead and were in control of the pace. At about 2:00am on our 157th lap, Siffert tried to pass three slower cars right in front of the pits. He swerved to the right and missed a gear right in front of the Porsche pits. The missed shift caused the 917 engine to disintegrate. Our dreams were shattered. As I’ve always said, nobody is perfect, though Seppi came pretty close.

Vic Elford went on for 225 laps (18 hours) before the engine in his Porsche Austria Salzburg long-tail expired. That left the underdog team of Attwood/ Herrmann in the #23 Salzburg 917K to cross the finish line in 1st place with a five-lap advantage. Porsche not only won its first overall win at Le Mans, but also finished 1,2,3, taking a podium sweep.

Next month I will go into detail regarding the three other races at Le Mans that broke my heart.