24 Hours of Le Mans

I'm not into cars. I'm not into auto racing. At all. However, about a month ago, I watched a documentary by NFL Films called Truth in 24, about the 24 Hours of Le Mans race that takes place at Le Mans every June. I was just reminded of this as I was thinking about Audis. The documentary is basically about Audi Motor Sports' teams and cars, and their road leading up to the 2008 24 Hours of Le Mans race. It was fabulous. And I'm absolutely not just saying that because Jason Statham narrates (I swear. We all learned from my earlier post about that God-awful Dungeon Siege movie that there are some thing that even Jason Statham does that I simply can't tolerate.). No, this was really very good. I couldn't shut it off, and I've been recommending it to people, and have begun watching it at least 2 more times. I completely recommend it; it's been on ESPN and Speed Network lately, and you can download the whole thing for FREE on iTunes.

This race is so fascinating to me. It really is the epitome of auto racing. These cars run, at upwards of 200 miles an hour sometimes, for over 24 hours straight. The best of the best of all engines in the world show up to challenge themselves and the rest of the best. The race was this past weekend. It was televised on Speed Network. I used to have Speed Network, but we changed our cable package, and now we don't have it anymore. I was so bummed when I found this out on Saturday morning when I went to turn on race coverage. I mean, it's not like I was going to watch it for 24 hours or something, but I did plan to at least check in now and then, and to watch the beginning and end of the race. So bummed. Anyway, I'm not going to ruin the movie by commenting at all, but I'll just report that Peugeot won this year's race, and finished second. Audi lost two of their three cars to an accident and mechanical troubles fairly early on, and their third car, under Kristensen's lead, finished a long third, 50 miles behind the leading Peugeot.

Good times; exciting stuff. Watch the movie, if you have the chance.

EDIT 6/26/09 - I'm not into cars? Not in a technical sense, I suppose, but really? A nice, high-end sports car is real, real hot. German engineering, what? I'm just saying . . .