Toyota comes close
The Toyota GT-One of Thierry Boutsen-Ralf Kelleners-Geoff Lees passes by at full speed during the 1998 Le Mans 24 Hours (picture-above). This car, designed by André de Cortanze and superbly driven, lead for most of the race, but was forced to retired with technical problems after 330 laps, and another possible Le Mans victory vanished for Toyota.
This 1998 edition of the great race saw a significant increase in manufacturer involvement. Porsche and Mercedes-Benz remained, with upgraded cars in both GT1 and LMP classes. Toyota sent three of their new, extremely fast GT-One cars, while BMW in association with WilliamsF1, launched the new BMW V12 LM. Nissan sent 4 of their new R390 GT1s, while the United States were represented by Panoz, who entered two cars, the Ford-powered Esperante GTR.
In the end Porsche won, as usual some would say, and scored a fantastic and well-deserved 1-2 with Aïello-McNish-Ortelli (picture-below) finishing one lap ahead of the sister Porsche 911 GT1-98 of Müller-Alzen-Wollek. Third was the Nissan R390 GT1 of Suzuki-Hoshino-Kageyama, after a solid race.