by Mike Gulett –
While most of the attention at the 1965 24 Hours of Le Mans was focused on the factory team entries of Ferrari and Ford, it was a privately entered one-year-old mid-engine 3.3-liter V12 Ferrari 250 LM which caused a major upset by winning, when the favored entries ran into trouble.
This 1965 Ferrari 250 LM is the last Ferrari to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans
Entered by the North American Racing Team (NART) of Luigi Chinetti, American Masten Gregory partnered with future world champion, Austrian Jochen Rindt for the unexpected win. The pair completed 347 laps of the 8.365 mile circuit, averaging 120.944 MPH for 24 hours.
This was the last time that a Ferrari would win the 24 Hours of Le Mans outright. The Ford GT40 dominated the next few years as we will see in the upcoming movie Ford v Ferrari.
The Ferrari 250 LM (LM standing for Le Mans) was introduced at the Paris Auto Show in 1963. It was intended to replace the Ferrari 250 GTO as Ferrari’s lead GT race car. But because Ferrari only built 32 250 LM examples they were not able to get the 250 LM homologated and so the 250 LM ran in the prototype class until 1966 when it was homologated as a Group 4 Sports Car.
This Ferrari looks like it’s going to win doesn’t it? This is the view that the other cars saw that day in 1965.
Let us know what you think in the Comments.
Photos by Mike Gulett at the 2013 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance.
And to think that Rindt had so little faith in it chances during the race that at one point he changed into his street clothes and said he waa going home…
Must watch!
There is a great 20min video on YouTube about the 1965 LM race and this car. “Le Mans 1965 is the craziest race you haven’t heard about”
It’s a VinWIKI video, and it’s a great one!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iR8FP1_pjn0
Mike, I think the Kansas City Comet, Masten Gregory, co-drove with Rindt. He was a very good driver but got the nickname from being able to exit a car very quickly before it crashed. An unsung American hero.
Robb Northrup
BACK IN THE 70s A GUY HAD ONE OF THESE CARS LICENSED FOR THE CALIFORNIA STREETS. HE CAME SCREAMING AROUND A CORNER AN WENT SIDEWAYS INTO A LIGHT POLE. THIS BURST A FUEL CEL AND GAS STARTED RUNNING DOWN THE STREET. A, DO GOODER IDIOT, CAME RUNNING OVER AND THREW A ROAD FLARE DOWN AND GAS CAUGHT IT, WENT BACK TO THE CAR. SO, ALL THEY COULD DO IS WATCH IT BURN. I DO NOT KNOW IF THERE WAS A MURDER. BUT HAD I BEN ON THE JURY, THE OWNER OF THE CAR WOULD HAVE WALKED.
The 1965 LM was the first international race win for Goodyear tyres.