Spa: Les 24 Heures de A à Z

On Saturday 19 July 1924 at 16:00, twenty-seven cars set off for the first edition of the 24 Hours of Francorchamps. After a gruelling round in rain and fog, Springuel-Becquet imposed a Bignan 2.0l capable of reaching 135 km/h on the long straights of the 15 km course. One hundred years later the 76th edition of the event with more than 70 state-of-the-art GT3s will take place on 29 and 30 June 2024. A close battle between BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Ferrari, Porsche, Lamborghini, McLaren, Aston Martin and Ford is expected.

One hundred years... That's worth a book, especially as the Ardennes event has undergone an astonishing evolution. Long overshadowed by its counterpart in Le Mans, it broke away from the latter in 1964 when its organisers opted for touring cars only. The ‘racing saloons’ took centre stage until 2000, when they were replaced by the GTs, whose battle for supremacy quickly became the benchmark, the most important meeting of the season for manufacturers, teams and drivers.

Illustrator and publisher Benoît Deliège with journalist Eric Faure wanted to look back on these one hundred years from a different perspective. Rather than a simple chronological review, the authors offer, on more than 300 abundantly illustrated pages - more than 850 photos and 20 watercolours - a book structured around 26 major themes. The range is vast, from the King's Cup to the most original machines seen in action, not forgetting the performances of the women competitors, the ‘behind the scenes’ characters without whom the race could not take place, the resounding successes and failures, the miracles and misfortunes that have punctuated these seventy-five editions, the records, the events on and around the track - in short, the countless facets of a race that is now known the world over. But that's not all: each letter of the alphabet also has its own little ‘dictionary’ based on a few key words, all of which of course relate to the 24 Hours of Francorchamps before it became Spa.