Le Mans Ltd., headquartered in

Shibuya Shibuya ( 渋谷区 ''Shibuya-ku'') is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. As a major commercial and finance center, it houses two of the busiest railway stations in the world, Shinjuku Station (southern half) and Shibuya Station. As of April 1 ...

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

is an automobile parts manufacturer founded in 1967. The original company name was Le Mans Chamber of Commerce. The company is mainly engaged in the development and sales of motorsport parts and the import and sale of race cars overseas. They also have a racing division called Team LeMans. The origin of the team name comes from

24 Hours of Le Mans The 24 Hours of Le Mans (french: link=no, 24 Heures du Mans) is an endurance-focused sports car race held annually near the town of Le Mans, France. It is the world's oldest active endurance racing event. Unlike fixed-distance races whose w ...

. The team currently competes in

Super GT Super GT (stylized as SUPER GT) is a sports car racing, grand touring car racing series that began in 1993. Launched as the , generally referred to as either the JGTC or the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship, the series was renamed to Super ...

, fielding the #6 Audi R8 LMS Evo II in the GT300 class for Yoshiaki Katayama and Roberto Merhi.

Team LeMans

In 1969 Team LeMans was established as a racing department of Le Mans Chamber of Commerce. It has been active in a variety of categories since the 1970s as one of the top teams of Japan. The team has competed in

single-seaters An open-wheel single-seater (often known as formula car) is a car with the wheels outside the car's main body, and usually having only one seat. Open-wheel cars contrast with street cars, sports cars, stock cars, and touring cars, which have t ...

since 1976, when they entered the All-Japan F2000 Championship. They served as the Japanese distributor of

Reynard Reynard the Fox is a literary cycle of medieval allegorical Dutch, English, French and German fables. The first extant versions of the cycle date from the second half of the 12th century. The genre was popular throughout the Late Middle Ages, ...

products until 2002. In 1991,

Michael Schumacher Michael Schumacher (; ; born 3 January 1969) is a German former racing driver who competed in Formula One for Jordan, Benetton, Ferrari, and Mercedes. Schumacher has a joint-record seven World Drivers' Championship titles (tied with Lewis ...

, before his

Formula One Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship ...

debut, raced with the team in the Sportsland SUGO round of the

Japanese Formula 3000 Championship The Japanese Super Formula Championship is a formula racing series. It is considered as being the top level of single-seater racing in Japan and regional motorsports in Asia. The series is sanctioned by the Japan Automobile Federation (JAF) and ...

, while in 1996 his brother Ralf became the champion with the same team. They also developed their own racing machine, that complied to

Group C Group C was a category of sports car racing introduced by the FIA in 1982 and continuing until 1993, with '' Group A'' for touring cars and '' Group B'' for GTs. It was designed to replace both Group 5 special production cars (closed top t ...

regulations. In 2012 in collaboration with Hideki Noda they founded "NODA racing Academy Senior High School", several engineers such as Donuma Hiroyoshi, the team principal, have served as lecturers at the school.

History

All-Japan F2000/F2/F3000 Championship

Their participation in the All Japan F2000 Championship started with Keiji Matsumoto in 1976. In 1979 he won the championship title. In 1988-89 Geoff Lees and

Emanuele Pirro Emanuele Pirro (born 12 January 1962) is an Italian racing driver who has raced in Formula One, touring cars and in endurance races such as the 24 Hours of Le Mans which he has won a total of five times. Two times Italian Karting Champion ( ...

raced for the team, both winning one race.

Formula Nippon

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 800, causing the plane to crash and killing everyone on b ...

, the team had its most successful year in Japan's top level open wheel series, when

Ralf Schumacher Ralf Schumacher (born 30 June 1975) is a German former racing driver. He is the younger brother of seven-time Formula One World Champion Michael Schumacher, and the pair are the only siblings to each win Formula One races. Schumacher began kar ...

and Naoki Hattori took the first two spots in the drivers' championship, also winning the first team title. The team repeated wins in the drivers and team championship with

Satoshi Motoyama Satoshi Motoyama (本山哲 - Motoyama Satoshi; born March 4, 1971) is a Japanese professional racing driver and team manager. He is best known for racing in the Super GT Series, formerly known as the All-Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

Fuji GC

The team achieved titles in The Fuji Grand Champion Series (Fuji GC) with in Keiji Matsumoto in 1983 and Geoff Lees in 1988 and 1989.

24 Hours of Le Mans

Team LeMans first entered the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1987 under the name Italya Sports. They competed in the race through 1990 without a single finish.

All-Japan GT Championship/Super GT

Team LeMans first entered the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship on its inaugural season in

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nelson Ma ...

, fielding a production based

Nissan 300ZX The Nissan 300ZX is a sports car that was produced across two different generations. As with all other versions of the Z, the 300ZX was sold within the Japanese domestic market under the name Fairlady Z. It was sold in Japan from 1983 to 2000 a ...

-LM in the GT1 class with FedEx as their primary sponsor. The team took three top-10 finishes with Masami Kageyama and finished 17th in the drivers standings. Kageyama and the 300ZX returned to compete in the following year, but the team failed to score any points and was not classified in the standings. For the 1996 season, Team LeMans bought an ex- IMSA Nissan 300ZX-GTS to compete in the rebranded GT500 class. Kageyama and series debutant Yuji Tachikawa took one top-10 finish in the final round of the championship at Mine Circuit and finished 25th in the drivers standings. Tachikawa stayed with the team for the 1997 season and was partnered by Tsuyoshi Takahashi, who replaced Kageyama after he was signed by SARD. The team took a 10th place finish in the season opening round at Suzuka, but a practice crash in the next round at Fuji totaled their 300ZX-GTS and the team was forced to withdraw their entry for the rest of the season. Team LeMans didn't take part in the 1998 season, but they returned in

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school s ...

after they took over the entry of the #6

Esso Esso () is a trade name, trading name for ExxonMobil. Originally, the name was primarily used by its predecessor Exxon, Standard Oil of New Jersey after the breakup of the original Standard Oil company in 1911. The company adopted the name "Ess ...

Tiger

Toyota Supra is a sports car and grand tourer manufactured by the Toyota Motor Corporation beginning in 1978. The name " supra" is derived from the Latin prefix, meaning "above", "to surpass" or "go beyond". The initial four generations of the Supra were p ...

from Inging Motorsport. LeMans signed former

driver Hideki Noda and reigning GT300 champion Shingo Tachi to compete with the team, but Tachi was killed in a pre-season testing accident at TI Aida with less than two weeks before the start of the 1999 season. Former

MotoGP Grand Prix motorcycle racing is the premier class of motorcycle road racing events held on road circuits sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM). Independent motorcycle racing events have been held since the start of ...

champion

Wayne Gardner Wayne Michael Gardner (born 11 October 1959) is an Australian former professional Grand Prix motorcycle and touring car racer. His most notable achievement was winning the 1987 500 cc Motorcycle World Championship, becoming the first Au ...

was then signed by the team to replace Tachi. The team took a pole position in the third round at Sportsland Sugo and a victory in the fifth round at

Fuji Speedway is a motorsport race track standing in the foothills of Mount Fuji, in Oyama, Suntō District, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. It was built in the early 1960s. In the 1980s, Fuji Speedway was used for the FIA World Sportscar Championship and na ...

on their first season with

Toyota is a Japanese multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi, Japan. It was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda and incorporated on . Toyota is one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world, producing about 10 ...

, finishing 12th in the drivers standings. In 2002, the team won drivers' championship in the GT500 class of the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship with Akira Iida and Juichi Wakisaka, who competed in a

race car. Wakisaka, as team principal, would later led Team LeMans to a second GT500 class title in 2019 with the driving pairing of

Kazuya Oshima is a Japanese racing driver, currently racing in the Super GT Series and the Super Formula Championship for Toyota Gazoo Racing and ROOKIE Racing. Oshima is one of only two drivers that have won championships in both classes of Super GT: He ...

and Kenta Yamashita, but the team left the series at the conclusion of the season. Team LeMans provided support to Hitotsuyama Racing in 2020 before they reentered the series in 2021 under a collaboration with Motoyama Racing. LeMans entered the #6 Audi R8 LMS Evo for ex-GT500 champion

and Yoshiaki Katayama, son of the team's owner Yoshinori Katayama, in the GT300 class. The team finished all races that year, but was not classified as they failed to score a points finish. Motoyama and Katayama returned the following year with an Evo II model of the Audi R8 LMS, but Motoyama was released after one round. Financial issues on Motoyama's sponsors was reported to be the primary reason of Motoyama's dismissal. Roberto Merhi was then signed by the team to replace Motoyama for the rest of the season.

Team LeMans Results

Super GT (JGTC)

Season still in progress

All Japan Sports Prototype Championship

24 Hours of Le Mans

Super Formula (Formula Nippon, Japanese Formula 3000, Japanese Formula 2000)

Footnotes

External links

Ltd. Le Mans

Team LeMans
{{DEFAULTSORT:Le Mans Japanese racecar constructors Japanese auto racing teams Automotive companies based in Tokyo Manufacturing companies based in Tokyo Japanese Formula 3 Championship teams Formula Nippon teams Super GT teams Super Formula teams Toyota in motorsport World Sportscar Championship teams Auto racing teams established in 1969