Mulsanne Straight / Hunaudieres Cafe
Discussion
Hello All,
This year will be my 3rd trip to Le Mans but I have yet to see a car at Vmax down the Mulsanne Straight. Is Hunaudieres Cafe the best place to watch? If so, any direction advice would be grateful. Are you even allowed to go and see the cars going done the Mulsanne Straight or is this a forbidden / inaccesible part of the track??
Thanks a lot
This year will be my 3rd trip to Le Mans but I have yet to see a car at Vmax down the Mulsanne Straight. Is Hunaudieres Cafe the best place to watch? If so, any direction advice would be grateful. Are you even allowed to go and see the cars going done the Mulsanne Straight or is this a forbidden / inaccesible part of the track??
Thanks a lot
You can just about see the cars from Hunaudieres cafe and it's legit. Need to climb up onto the benches in their beer garden (or do a bit of exploring once you get there). Hotel Arbor is probably better as the viewing is much less restricted, it's a bit harder to get to though. Many people walk through the fields to get to the Mulsanne but it's not advisable!
I've spent the last six years with the marshals on the Mulsanne and I've seen how security has tightened up. I have a press pass but even so they demand now to see the wrist band or else they throw me off post. Guests are not allowed within 25 metres of the guard rails even if invited by the marshals. Elsewhere there are continuous police patrols up and down all forbidden zones plus of course the cameras which might pick you up as well as a car! Yes, it's fun to try but it is getting to be tough. Camoflage gear etc. might be advisory! Oh, and the Mulsanne isn't the fastest area now anyway; that is between Mulsanne bend and Indianapolis where the Peugeot 908 was clocked at 223mph last year in the preliminaries. Thsi photo was taken from the marshal's post inside the track.
Edited by lowdrag on Sunday 20th April 13:31
I like Lowdrag's post above. Makes my story all the more cool.
Last year my brother and I tried the 'Midnight Mulsanne Mannouver' at about 2am and struggled through the undergrowth with a cooler-bag full of Kronenbourg stubbies, but were turned back by patrolling staff. Result: thorn scratched knuckles and a taste for danger.
We ambled back towards Houx Annexe and tuned towards the track at one point, towards a medical station. No one stopped us, walked past paramedics having snacks, drawn like moths to the track.
Keep going and nod at some marshalls who are not in anyway interested in our legitimacy in being there, cooler bag under arm, Kronies clinking gently.
Now we're 3metres from track, ahead is a little grassy mound just behind the armco. We climb onto the mound. No fence, no people, warm tarmac and headlights coming in.
First car to pass is the Panoz..... at 200mph.... in the pitch black.....about 2m away....nothing to stop us walking onto the track..
We stayed for about 20 mins, at which time my hearing was going and the Kronenbourg ran out. It honestly was dificult to tear ourselves away from this little viewpoint. Nobody can describe the feeling and noise when two or three cars go past simultaneously at 200mph, in a chasing pack. The only experience more noisy/frightening was a F15 fly-by at USAF Lakenheath in 1990s.
Said grassy knoll is my little secret and high on the list for things-to-achieve in 2008!
Last year my brother and I tried the 'Midnight Mulsanne Mannouver' at about 2am and struggled through the undergrowth with a cooler-bag full of Kronenbourg stubbies, but were turned back by patrolling staff. Result: thorn scratched knuckles and a taste for danger.
We ambled back towards Houx Annexe and tuned towards the track at one point, towards a medical station. No one stopped us, walked past paramedics having snacks, drawn like moths to the track.
Keep going and nod at some marshalls who are not in anyway interested in our legitimacy in being there, cooler bag under arm, Kronies clinking gently.
Now we're 3metres from track, ahead is a little grassy mound just behind the armco. We climb onto the mound. No fence, no people, warm tarmac and headlights coming in.
First car to pass is the Panoz..... at 200mph.... in the pitch black.....about 2m away....nothing to stop us walking onto the track..
We stayed for about 20 mins, at which time my hearing was going and the Kronenbourg ran out. It honestly was dificult to tear ourselves away from this little viewpoint. Nobody can describe the feeling and noise when two or three cars go past simultaneously at 200mph, in a chasing pack. The only experience more noisy/frightening was a F15 fly-by at USAF Lakenheath in 1990s.
Said grassy knoll is my little secret and high on the list for things-to-achieve in 2008!
The_Doc said:
I like Lowdrag's post above. Makes my story all the more cool.
Last year my brother and I tried the 'Midnight Mulsanne Mannouver' at about 2am and struggled through the undergrowth with a cooler-bag full of Kronenbourg stubbies, but were turned back by patrolling staff. Result: thorn scratched knuckles and a taste for danger.
We ambled back towards Houx Annexe and tuned towards the track at one point, towards a medical station. No one stopped us, walked past paramedics having snacks, drawn like moths to the track.
Keep going and nod at some marshalls who are not in anyway interested in our legitimacy in being there, cooler bag under arm, Kronies clinking gently.
Now we're 3metres from track, ahead is a little grassy mound just behind the armco. We climb onto the mound. No fence, no people, warm tarmac and headlights coming in.
First car to pass is the Panoz..... at 200mph.... in the pitch black.....about 2m away....nothing to stop us walking onto the track..
We stayed for about 20 mins, at which time my hearing was going and the Kronenbourg ran out. It honestly was dificult to tear ourselves away from this little viewpoint. Nobody can describe the feeling and noise when two or three cars go past simultaneously at 200mph, in a chasing pack. The only experience more noisy/frightening was a F15 fly-by at USAF Lakenheath in 1990s.
Said grassy knoll is my little secret and high on the list for things-to-achieve in 2008!
You think F15's are loud?! You wanna try 3 Rockwell B1's taking off for a flyby at The Royal Air Tattoo, RAF Fairford. Your intestine feels like its rupturing and once the temperary defness fades your left with the sound of a thousend car alarms. AWSOME!!!!!Last year my brother and I tried the 'Midnight Mulsanne Mannouver' at about 2am and struggled through the undergrowth with a cooler-bag full of Kronenbourg stubbies, but were turned back by patrolling staff. Result: thorn scratched knuckles and a taste for danger.
We ambled back towards Houx Annexe and tuned towards the track at one point, towards a medical station. No one stopped us, walked past paramedics having snacks, drawn like moths to the track.
Keep going and nod at some marshalls who are not in anyway interested in our legitimacy in being there, cooler bag under arm, Kronies clinking gently.
Now we're 3metres from track, ahead is a little grassy mound just behind the armco. We climb onto the mound. No fence, no people, warm tarmac and headlights coming in.
First car to pass is the Panoz..... at 200mph.... in the pitch black.....about 2m away....nothing to stop us walking onto the track..
We stayed for about 20 mins, at which time my hearing was going and the Kronenbourg ran out. It honestly was dificult to tear ourselves away from this little viewpoint. Nobody can describe the feeling and noise when two or three cars go past simultaneously at 200mph, in a chasing pack. The only experience more noisy/frightening was a F15 fly-by at USAF Lakenheath in 1990s.
Said grassy knoll is my little secret and high on the list for things-to-achieve in 2008!
E36GUY said:
That's the way to do it. As The Doc says, nighttime guerilla missions through the woods are the way forward. Just don't give yourselves away by using flashlights to get there!
These guerilla missions are the highlight of the 24hr for me. Results of last year's trekking HERE
Awesome footage TimJMS
I've been reading these mulsanne adventure threads with enthusiam, and having been to Le Mans the last four years this looks like its got to be a 'must do' in 2008. But one question which nobody seems to have discussed, what happens if you get caught doing the Mulsanne? Is it just a ticking off and you're sent away with a flea in your ear, or a fine or what? It would be a great shame to get banged up overnight for it on the night of the race.
I've been reading these mulsanne adventure threads with enthusiam, and having been to Le Mans the last four years this looks like its got to be a 'must do' in 2008. But one question which nobody seems to have discussed, what happens if you get caught doing the Mulsanne? Is it just a ticking off and you're sent away with a flea in your ear, or a fine or what? It would be a great shame to get banged up overnight for it on the night of the race.
Trying it from outside the circuit would result in immediate failure. Since they've floodlit the circuit the gendarmes patrol all the Mulsanne on the outside since NO ONE, BUT NO ONE is allowed except the odd marshals post on that side. Chicanes and the Auberge for example. However, there are many posts on the inside of the track and therefore lots of people. One or two more don't sometimes get noticed. If the marshals spot someone on the other side they'll immediately telephone back to security to have them removed. Arrive on a post inside the circuit and sometimes they'll think you are friends of one of the marshals. A great spot to try for would be on the inside of Mulsanne/Arnage - you'll have to avoid many controls and avoid the dirt roads but it would be one hell of an achievement! Guerillas rule! Oh - I promise to say nothing as I quietly shoot away - I can be found anywhere from Tertre rouge to Arnage including the roundabout at Mulsanne! These few at dawn from the roundabout:-
No, I don't have the right but knowing the duty doctor does help!
No, I don't have the right but knowing the duty doctor does help!
Our Saturday night routine is to park up in their carpark and have a Chineese at the Hunaudieres.
Route there is a bit tricky in the dark!
We then drive down to Muslanne corner just after midnight and walk along the side on the track to the corner itself.
All this is legal and gains no Kudos at all I know.
But from our experience on the outside of the track the Police do not stand for anything!!
As has been said already, from the Mulsanne corner down is spectacular at night!
Route there is a bit tricky in the dark!
We then drive down to Muslanne corner just after midnight and walk along the side on the track to the corner itself.
All this is legal and gains no Kudos at all I know.
But from our experience on the outside of the track the Police do not stand for anything!!
As has been said already, from the Mulsanne corner down is spectacular at night!
Now of course I NEVER said this did I? Thursday night practice; there is a golf competition in the afternoon and you must get to the golf club before 1pm when they shut the road but the bar at the club is open. Unfortunately you are now shut in from 1pm so you have to stay until they open the road at 1am and suffer the view from the inside of Mulsanne bend or exit down the rutted track which comes out between McDonalds and Karting Nord. Shhh - it's a secret just between you and I!
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