2004 Le Mans Rain Finish

Lore & Background

The race was founded by Road Atlanta owner Don Panoz to bring the rules and spirit of the 24 Hours of Le Mans to North America. The success of the inaugural event in 1998 led to the creation of the American Le Mans Series in 1999. Petit Le Mans was a flagship event for the ALMS. Since 2014 the race has been one of the crown jewel events of the IMSA SportsCar Championship. Class winners originally received an automatic invitation to the following year's 24 Hours of Le Mans, but this was removed in 2012.

Reader's Guide

The race is held at Road Atlanta, a 2.54-mile (4.09 km) permanent road course with twelve turns, significant elevation changes, and high-speed sections. The race has been run for 10 hours since 2014; prior to that it was run for either 1,000 miles or 10 hours, whichever came first. Teams use multiple drivers, usually three per entry. The race is contested with multiple car classes split into prototype and GT categories. It is one of the Endurance Cup rounds in the IMSA SportsCar Championship and traditionally serves as the season-ending round.

Did You Know?

• Rinaldo Capello holds the record of most race wins, having won in 2000, 2002, 2006, 2007 and 2008.
• The 2009 and 2015 races were shortened due to heavy rains making the track impassable.
• The 2015 race featured the first time a GT car won overall against the faster prototypes.
• Panoz's participation in the 1998 race with the Q9 GTR-1 Hybrid marked the first time in motorsport history that hybrid technology had been used to record a race start, finish, and class win.