Mansell crashes out of Le Mans

Published on Saturday 12 June 2010 21:06

FORMER Formula One world champion Nigel Mansell's first Le Mans 24 hour endurance race yesterday lasted just 17 minutes before he crashed heavily after an apparent puncture.

His car piled at high speed into barriers after the Mulsanne Corner, with Mansell helpless to prevent the collision. The 1992 F1 world champion suffered a head knock in the crash and had to be assisted from the car and into an ambulance before he was taken to a local hospital for tests.

The 56-year-old, who was born in Worcestershire, was competing in a Ginetta Zytek for the Beechdean Mansell team with his sons Greg and Leo, the first time that a father and two sons have taken part in the famous race.

Greg Mansell said last night: "He's having some extra checks. He took a bit of a knock but he should be fine. With the adrenalin it's better to be safe than sorry. At the moment, it looks like something happened on the rear going down the straight but we don't know what it was yet."

The race's official website, www.lemans.org, revealed that Mansell was "fine" after receiving "a bump on the head"

Mansell featured in several massive shunts during his racing career. The double BBC Sports Personality of the Year broke his neck in qualifying for a Formula Ford race in 1977, and was in a Williams F1 which suffered a spectacular puncture in the 1986 Australian Grand Prix.

He injured his back in a crash in the American IndyCar series in 1993, the same year he was knocked unconscious in a crash during a British Touring Car Championship race.

Perhaps ironically, Mansell's first Le Mans race was to have been as long ago as 1982 while he was competing in F1 for Lotus. The Lotus company's owner Colin Chapman paid Mansell 10,000 not to race at Le Mans because he was convinced the race was too dangerous.

Mansell was yesterday trying to gain a good result to attract sponsorship for the team which is run by his sons.

The former special constable is no stranger to the high performance sports cars used at Le Mans which often reach the speeds of Grand Prix cars and sustain those speeds over much longer than an F1 race.

Mansell won the IndyCar championship in 1993 before returning to the Grand Prix circuit for a brief period and has since competed in many types of cars. His British record of 31 Grand Prix victories still stands.

Mansell's accident hindered the chances of Scotland's Allan McNish winning a third Le Mans title.

Early in the race on the damp and slippery 13.4km Sarthe circuit the diesel-engined Peugeots – last year's winners – filled the top four places while Audi were holding the next three ahead of two Lola Aston Martins.

The three safety cars had to be deployed for 31 minutes while Mansell, left, was treated, and McNish and his two co-drivers in an Audi R15 TDI lost over a minute on the three leading Peugeots.

But Peugeot themselves suffered a blow when their number three car, which ex-Formula One driver and four times ChampCar champion Sebastien Bourdais had put on pole, withdrew from the race with a front suspension failure.

McNish's car was then in fourth but later slipped down the field. The race concludes later today.