A movie scenario
Porsche was the clear favourite for the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans and the JWA team entered three Gulf-livered 917Ks.
The lead car was driven by Jo Siffert and Brian Redman, who had already won two rounds of the championship. Pedro Rodriguez, a Le Mans winner for John Wyer in 1968 (with Belgian Lucien Bianchi) and Leo Kinnunen, in the second car, had won three races. Brits David Hobbs and Mike Hailwood, had the third car (the #22) fitted with a 4.5-litre engine, where the sister cars were powered by the new 5.0-litre engine.
Early in the race, Mike Hailwood in the #22 Gulf Porsche 917K, had been signalled to pit for rain tyres, but crashed a few corners later and his race was over (picture above). Look at the speeding blue Porsche 908/3 in the background. It’s the car filming Steve McQueen’s Le Mans movie.
The Siffert-Redman car ran strongly, building a huge 10-lap lead by 2am. That was until Siffert accidentally missed a gear-change lapping back-markers and broke the engine. Hans Herrmann and Richard Attwood in their red and white Salzburg Porsche 917K, ran prudently in the rain and won by five laps.
Picture below: The blue 908/3 car was carrying a huge camera, because Steve McQueen was filming his movie “Le Mans”, that will be released in 1971. It was driven by German Herbert Linge and Brit Jonathan Williams. Speaking of McQueen, that particular blue 908/3 was driven by himself and Peter Revson to second place at Sebring that year.
