If any Silk Cut Jaguar XJR-9LM was going to win, it was going to have to beat the Porsche 962C of Derek Bell, Hans Stuck and Klaus Ludwig, the Stuttgart firm’s standard bearers, and both Stuck and John Watson, Jaguar’s philosopher, predicted a particularly hard contest which would go the whole distance. They were so right!

A superb victory was achieved by Jan Lammers, the Dutchman who took the brunt of duties, by Johnny Dumfries, who easily overcame early-season disappointments, and by Andy Wallace, Tom Walkinshaw’s young protege who had never driven around the circuit until the first qualifying session, and had to screw up the courage to take the infamous Mulsanne kink “flat”.

“They tell me you can overtake slower cars at the kink without lifting, but I’ll practice that when, the track’s clear,” said the likeable Oxford driver, who had been to Le Mans as a spectator some years ago, and most now be the envy of 50,000 or more Britons who made their pilgrimage to the Sarthe.