The BMW V12 LMR is a Le Mans Prototype built for sports car racing from 1999 to 2000. The car was built through an alliance between BMW Motorsport and Williams Racing and was the successor to the failed BMW V12 LM of 1998. It is famous for earning BMW its only overall victory to date at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. For the Le Mans race, only two cars appeared. In qualifying the two LMRs again showed their speed, taking 3rd and 6th places, again beaten only by the Toyota GT-Ones. During the race the V12 LMRs ran strong, outlasting many closed cockpit competitors which suffered woes. In the second half of the race, BMW’s main competitors were a pair of open-cockpit Audi R8Rs and the lone remaining Toyota GT-One. In the closing hours of the race, the #17 BMW V12 LMR driven by JJ Lehto crashed heavily in the Porsche Curves section of the track due to a stuck throttle. This left the #15 BMW LMR in the lead, less than a lap ahead of the 2nd place Toyota. The BMW V12 LMR is estimated to put out about 580 hp, which in the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans allowed the German prototype to hit 342 km/h (214 mph) on the Mulsanne Straight. The driving team of Joachim Winkelhock, Pierluigi Martini, and Yannick Dalmas were successful in bringing the V12 LMR home for the victory, a single lap ahead of the GT-One. We celebrate the first BMW victory at LeMans with an AI generated image …
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