a cracked weld in its gearbox stopped it for good. Within a matter of minutes, the Ickx/Oliver Ford now found itself in the lead. The Herrmann/Larrousse Porsche had been driving hard making up time and when the other Wyer Ford lost two laps changing its rear brakes it moved up to second place. Finish and post-race Going into the final hour after their final pit-stops, both teams put their best drivers in the cars. Ickx and Herrmann were now on the same lap, barely 10 seconds apart. The Porsche 908 had fading brakes and an engine now 400rpm down on power and the Ford GT40 suffered from exhaust problems, making for a very even contest. In a dramatic finish, Ickx and Herrmann repeatedly overtook each other. Ickx knew if he led onto the Mulsanne straight, Herrmann would pass, but he could slipstream past him back again before the Mulsanne corner and then hold a lead for the rest of a lap. But by strange timing the cars crossed the line with less than a minute to go and had to go around one more time. The Ford had only ever done 23 laps on a tank of fuel, but now needed an extra lap. So on the last lap, Ickx let Herrmann pass him early on the Mulsanne Straight, faking a lack of power from fuel starvation. Ickx used the slipstream of Herrmann to pass him again just before the end of the 5 km straight. Ickx then managed to hold on and beat Herrmann by a few seconds, and a distance of about . Ickx and Oliver won with the GT40 chassis #1075 (nicknamed the 'Old Lady'), the same car that had won the previous year. This was only the second time the same car had won two years in a row; a Bentley Speed Six had done it in 1929 and 1930. Ickx dedicated the team's victory to Lucien Bianchi, who had been killed earlier in the year, and had helped the Wyer team win the Le Mans the previous year. The Hobbs and Hailwood Wyer Ford, after its delay, finished third four laps behind, just ahead of the Matra of Beltoise/Courage. The older Matra of Vaccarella/Guichet was 5th a distant 9 laps behind and the German Ford of Kelleners/Joest 6th an even further 18 laps behind them. The veteran NART Ferrari 275LM finished eighth, covering less than