This time twelve months ago, TORA had completed its fourth annual running of their most prestigious endurance race of them all, the TORA 24 Heures Du Mans.
The field last year was absolutely ginormous with a total of 50 cars taking to the grid and somehow, all of them scrambled to the finish line after 24 hours of arduous, tense, physically challenging but extremely exciting racing.
Last years event was eventually won by the F4H Red Sonia team, which was F4H’s second overall victory in succession. Could they make it three years on the trot? In case you missed last years race, here’s the Youtube playlist of the 2013 TORA Le Mans 24 Hours:



Now, twelve months on, the dedicated staff are already planning to host the 2014 edition which will be the second round of this years TORA Endurance Championship.
But before the main event begins on the 28th & 29th June, we had the official test day which was hosted on Sunday 1st June from the Circuit De La Sarthe. Conditions were perfect all through the test with temperatures at a constant 76°F (roughly 24.5°C) so the drivers could rely on their tyres sticking to the asphalt with their low downforce configurations on their highly tuned machines.

Just to give you a fantastic guide of the Le Mans circuit, we have three onboard laps from completed different eras. This first one is of an onboard lap from 1956 with Mike Hawthorn driving you around in his Jaguar D Type. How gigantic is that camera mounted on the rear of the Jag?!



Fast forward another 27 years to 1983 and we find Derek Bell in one of the Group C monsters, the Porsche 956. Notice here on the Mulsanne Straight, there are no chicanes so the cars would be full throttle for over a minute. This gave the drivers a chance of reaching speeds in excess of 230+mph.



Finally, it only seems fitting as we fast forward to the present day that we should provide you with an onboard lap of Le Mans in the present day with the late Allan Simonsen (who was sadly killed in the 2013 Le Mans 24 Hours) in the Ferrari 458 GTE.



Just before the official test began, we sat down with some of the drivers in the hospitality area and asked them a few questions about this event and what they hoped to achieve in the 24 hour race.

Q1: In your honest opinion, why do you feel that Le Mans is such a special event compared to other major endurance races?


Q2: A lot of drivers in the past have said that taking part in this event is just as emotional as entering the real Le Mans race. What do you feel is the key ingredient which makes this such a spectacle amongst the TORA community?





Q3: What is your favourite section of the Le Mans circuit & why?






Q4: (If you have participated in the TORA LM24 in the past) What has been your favourite moment from previous TORA LM24 events you’ve entered and why?







Q5: What are your personal expectations on this years TORA LM24 event?





We personally would like to thank Erebus, Steve, Bellmond, James, Dragon and Mopar for taking their time to talk to us.

Of the 15 teams that have registered thus far for this years race, a total of 15 drivers from 8 teams took part in this test. And all of them turned up to the circuit nice and early to prepare for a busy day ahead of them.
Just walking through the pit lane 20 minutes before the first session begun, the garages were a sea of mechanics tinkering with the cars with their spanners, laptops, fuel rigs and wheel guns. The aroma of petrol & oil coming from the garages is something that only a true petrol head would quote as being “heaven”. The most activity was coming from CRA Urban’s car as the teams mechanics were in panic mode, trying to repair two things at the same time. An oil leak followed by a slight electrical glitch in the Lola Honda almost put an end to Urban’s day before it even begun.

When the session finally began at 10:00am local time, all of the competitors rolled out onto the circuit at the same time. And what a mixture of cars we had. From the screaming, belching V12 engine from the Lola Aston Martin of MATT PASTRAMNI, to the deep, rumbling bellow of the Corvettes and Ford GT’s. Those cars certainly made your chest vibrate every time they roared past the start/finish line.
The session was full of incident, mainly due to one or two competitors having difficulties. But at the end of the day, it was The Bulin Wall5 who was fastest in the LMP category with a time of 3:22.120. However, his time wasn’t official because he’s registered for the GTE class with LMR Red Dragon, Instead, he decided to bring along two LMP machines, the Peugeot 908 and the Acura ARX-01b.
Instead, honours for the best time went to JamesHall94 in the Benedict Racing Aston Martin AMR-One with a best time of 3:24.449. A stellar effort considering that the AMR-One isn't the best car on the grid.



Second, just under eight tenths of a second behind was the CRA Rockstar Racing Lola Mazda of Dragonsyoung with a time of 3:25.229. He was unable to improve his time late in the day due to an incident with two other LMP cars of The Bulin Wall5 and MATT PASTRAMNI. Coming down the fast section to Indianapolis, Bulin and Matt collided at high speed which caused a massive crash for MATT, with his car rolling and flipping in mid air. Dragon was the next car on the scene and was unable to avoid the spinning MATT. This more or less placed all three cars out for the remainder of the test session. Thankfully, MATT was able to walk away without too much injury.





In the GTE class, there wasn't a huge variety although you had a huge quantity of Corvette's, 4 in total. However, it was one of the two Ford GT's which ended us setting the quickest time. LMR Deftone MX in the LMR Red Dragon car was quickest by over two second with a blistering time of 3:56.494. A surprise second quickest in GTE was the Maranello Motorsport Ferrar 458 of ShrinkingSteven with a time of 3:58.766. No doubt in this young mans mind, his has justified his reasonings for joining the team.
Third fastest in GTE was the first of the Corvette's driven by IBlueIJaBBRexI in the Mushroom Kingdom Racers machine.





Here's a couple of more pictures from the offical test including the Folstak Racing Corvette of LMR Mopar in their test livery







As soon as the sun started to set, the teams packed all of their vehicles into the massive trucks and the drivers all set off to their hotel rooms for a well earned rest. But they can reflect on what has been a pretty good and useful test session for all involved. Here is the final standings with the best times from the session.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GKX74tmZrFn6SaG-AxI0krsSRook_6eXMcx3bqD6OUM/edit?usp=sharing

All we look forward to now is for the qualifying sessions to begin just one week before the main event. If you haven't already, please be sure to register for this epic endurance if you want to take part via the link below:

http://forums.theonlineracingassociation.com/t13302-2014-msa-tora-24-hours-of-lemans-sign-ups-entry-thread

For now, Happy Racing everyone.0

Author: Daniel Austins (ATR DAN)