the Bentley get ahead. The handicapping favoured the smaller car and Eaton's hard driving soon retook the lead only to lose it again when they pitted to free a stuck throttle. When a late stop delayed Howe in the Alfa Romeo, the Talbots once again were in third and fourth. Finish and post-race Once again Bentley staged a formation finish. Woolf Barnato, getting back-to-back victories in the same Speed-Six chassis as he driven to win in 1929, promptly announced his retirement with the enviable Le Mans record of three entries for three outright wins. In the end the Alfa Romeo was only eighteen kilometres (1 lap) behind the Talbots. British drivers filled the first six places with the privateer Lea-Francis coming home in sixth. Despite the early delay, Peacock and Newsome still covered four more laps than their previous year's effort. In a tight finish, Talbot won the Index prize by the narrowest of margins: only 0.004 from the winning Bentley, amounting to barely a lap between them. Three French cars were the remaining finishers, highlighted by the women in the Bugatti after a trouble-free run to seventh, and Jean-Albert Grégoire leading home both his Tracta cars. Grégoire was lucky to finish, as he had just put his car in a ditch on his last lap. Unofficial help from spectators pulled him out in time. It was a curious fact that the Bentleys had a number of tyre delaminations of their Dunlops. Whereas the Talbots, and Mercedes (albeit abbreviated), had run on their starting set of Dunlops through their whole race. Bentley had now achieved five wins in the first eight Le Mans. But like many other manufacturers, the company was hit hard with plummeting demand in the Great Depression and soon after Bentley disbanded its works racing team. In 1931 Barnato let two loan repayments lapse. The receivers were called in and in November the company was bought out by Rolls-Royce. Nor did Glen Kidston get back to Le Mans. A keen pilot, he was attempting an endurance record from England to Cape Town when he was killed on the return route when his plane broke up pin stormy weather. In October, Dorothy Paget withdrew her financial support for the Blower Bentley project after ongoing unreliability and only limited success. Philippe de Rothschild, knowing his identity was now revealed, retired from racing to build his family company into one