Courage : The 'near miss' of 1995.
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Courage : The 'near miss' of 1995.

The 'near miss' of 1995

When a near formality turned into a disaster. How the whim of a sponsor denied them victory in 1995.

In 1995, hopes were high at Courage, a manufacturer based in La Sarthe and successors to local hero Rondeau. In the absence of major manufacturers in the top prototype class, the cars of Yves Courage were among the fastest, and reliability seemed assured by the official support of engine partner Porsche. However, nothing would go as planned!

The deluge!

From the start, the heavy rain wreaked havoc with prototypes and the advantage went to the GT cars. In early evening, the famous Mario Andretti made a mistake in trying to keep pace and broke the suspension of his Courage against a wall of the Porsche Curves. The repair that followed lasted more than half an hour, but all was not lost, the improving weather expected for Sunday was expected give a decisive advantage to the prototypes.

Double trouble

However, the unexpected zeal of a sponsor who, in the early morning called for a change of the rear bodywork to allow his logo to be seen. What should have been a simple operation turned into a nightmare when one of the latches, damaged by the earlier accident, was jammed, and its release took 4 minutes. It turned out to be a minute too long, because, as expected, the return of the sun speeded up the prototypes, and soon No.13 trailed by only 3 minutes behind the winning McLaren. Although a failure, this result remained the best for Courage. Even the great Henri Pescarolo was unable to do better when his team is finished second in 2005 and 2006.

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