Claude Ballot-Léna
Claude Ballot -Lena (* August 4, 1936 in Paris, † 9 November 1999) was a French racing driver.
" I am here for the inventory like an old tool box ", Claude Ballot -Lena said in an interview in 1989, when he came to the 23rd time to Le Mans to compete in the 24 -hour race ..
Former boxer, tennis players and cyclists proved in over 30 years, his versatility in motorsport. First experience was gained in the early 1960s with small rallies and hill climbs in the French province. The tall and brawny Frenchman also dabbled briefly in the single-seater and in the mid- 1960s native to sports car racing. Four times - 1972, 1974, 1975 and 1976 - he won the French GT Championship in 1973 and the European Championship.
His greatest successes came in endurance racing. In 1969, he won together with his longtime partner Guy Chasseuil the 24 - hour race at Spa -Francorchamps on a Porsche 911 in 1983, he secured together with Bob Wollek, AJ Foyt and Preston Henn on a Porsche 935 overall victory at the 24 -hour of Daytona. In Le Mans were only his two compatriots Henri Pescarolo and Bob Wollek and Yojiro Terada Japanese more often at the start than he. In 1977, he managed there with Peter Gregg Porsche 935 with the third overall his only podium finish. Ballot - Léna stood in his career 154 times on the podium of the first three and secured 71 overall and class victories in the most diverse racing events.
He drove many years racing in the IMSA GTP series in the U.S., with occasional forays into NASCAR, where he was also at the Daytona 500 at the start. A few months before his death - he died in December 1999 at a long terminal illness - he gave the French magazine Auto Hebdo an interview and looked back at his career. "If I pull the balance today, so I have no regrets. I never thought of myself as a high-flyer. With the resources that were available to me, I have a decent career behind me. I've had enough when people respond later to the question of who was Ballot Léna very simple:. That was a racing driver "