PHOTOGRAPHY MAX EDLESTON
'I think the whole thing is crazy. Nobodyʼll finish. Cars arenʼt designed to stand that sort of strain for 24 hours.ʼ Today itʼs almost unimaginable that those words came from Walter Owen Bentley, the very man whose company was to become inextricably linked with the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Recounted in his 1958 autobiography, it was a view WO had expressed in 1923, immediately before Bentley Motorsʼ first outing at the Circuit de La Sarthe. Had it not been for Bentley agent John Duff ʼs encouragement, the firmʼs founder would not have supported the sole 3 Litre model that had entered the inaugural running of the event. But by the time Duff and Bentleyʼs Frank Clement had brought the car home in joint fourth place, WO was hooked. Seven years and five outright works wins later, Bentleyʼs Le Mans legacy was entrenched.
An important part of that legacy is with us today. YW 5758, a 1928 Vanden Plas-bodied 4½ Litre, is now widely recognised as the most successful surviving original-bodied Bentley team car from the ʻWOʼ era, with a competition provenance that includes not only a notable finish at Le Mans, but also significant results at the important Irish circuits of the day, as well as right here at Brooklands.