Tom Kristensen (racing driver)

Tom Kristensen (born 7 July 1967) is a former Danish professional racing driver. He holds the record for the most wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with nine, six of which were consecutive (from 2000 to 2005). In 1997, he won the race with the Joest Racing team, driving a Tom Walkinshaw Racing-designed and Porsche-powered WSC95, after being a late inclusion in the team following Davy Jones' accident that eventually ruled him out of the race. All of his wins since then have come driving an Audi prototype, except in 2003, when he drove a Bentley prototype. In both 1999 and 2007 Kristensen's team crashed out of comfortable leads in the closing hours of the race. He is considered by many to be the greatest driver ever to have raced in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, earning the nickname "Mr Le Mans". Elsewhere Kristensen also holds the record for most wins at the 12 Hours of Sebring with a total of six.

In August 2014, Kristensen was appointed Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog by the Queen of Denmark.

Kristensen was born in Hobro. His career began in 1984, winning several karting titles. He raced in Japan in the early 1990s, concurrently in Formula 3 and Touring Cars. He was German Formula 3 Champion in 1991, Japanese Formula 3 champion in 1993, and runner-up in the Japanese Touring Car Championship (JTCC) in 1992 and 1994. He was 6th in Formula 3000 in both 1996 and 1997, and test driver for Tyrrell in their final Formula One season in 1998, and for Michelin as they prepared their F1 tyres using an older Williams car in 2000. He was 3rd in the STW Cup in Germany in 1999, 7th in the British Touring Car Championship in 2000, and winner of the 12 Hours of Sebring in both those years.

Kristensen driving for Audi (Abt) at the Hockenheimring in the 2008 Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters season.

On 22 April 2007, Kristensen was involved in an accident while racing on the Hockenheimring race course in Hockenheim, Germany. The crash resulted in a long break from training for Kristensen, and his participation in the 2007 Le Mans race was in jeopardy. However, Kristensen recuperated quickly, and was cleared by the Le Mans doctors to start the race. It was reported that a new type of collar may have prevented him suffering a broken neck in the crash.

Kristensen took his 9th 24 Hours of Le Mans victory in an Audi R18 e-tron quattro in 2013.

In 2000, 2001, and 2002, he won the 24 Hours at Le Mans race with the Audi R8 along with Frank Biela and Emanuele Pirro, becoming the first three drivers since Jacky Ickx in 1977 to win the race on three straight occasions. In 2003, he won the race with Bentley. In 2004, he equalled Ickx's record of six Le Mans victories in Team Goh's Audi R8. 2005 saw Kristensen win a seventh time with an American R8 entry, making him the most successful driver at the Le Mans 24-hour race (Ickx left a message on Kristensen's answering machine congratulating him on breaking his record). The 2006 race saw Kristensen finishing in third place in the new diesel-powered Audi R10. Kristensen did not finish the 2007 race following Rinaldo Capello's crash while the car was leading the race by four laps. Kristensen returned in 2008 to claim an eighth victory and extend the record for most wins. In 2013, he took his ninth victory at the event, extending his record and legendary status even further. Also he has received nickname "Mr Le Mans" because of the record of winning Le Mans 9 times total.

On 19 November 2014, Kristensen announced at a press conference in Copenhagen that he was retiring from motorsport at the end of the current World Endurance Championship season.

Complete 24 Hours of Le Mans results

Walk of fame - Le Mans, Handprints and signatures from the winners of the 2013 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1997	Joest Racing	Michele Alboreto Stefan Johansson	TWR Porsche WSC-95	LMP	361	1st	1st
1998	Team BMW Motorsport	Hans-Joachim Stuck Steve Soper	BMW V12 LM	LMP1	60	DNF	DNF
1999	Team BMW Motorsport	JJ Lehto Jörg Müller	BMW V12 LMR	LMP	304	DNF	DNF
2000	Audi Sport Team Joest	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP900	368	1st	1st
2001	Audi Sport Team Joest	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP900	321	1st	1st
2002	Audi Sport Team Joest	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP900	375	1st	1st
2003	Team Bentley	Rinaldo Capello Guy Smith	Bentley Speed 8	LMGTP	377	1st	1st
2004	Audi Sport Japan Team Goh	Seiji Ara Rinaldo Capello	Audi R8	LMP1	379	1st	1st
2005	ADT Champion Racing	JJ Lehto Marco Werner	Audi R8	LMP1	370	1st	1st
2006	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	367	3rd	3rd
2007	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	262	DNF	DNF
2008	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	381	1st	1st
2009	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R15 TDI	LMP1	376	3rd	3rd
2010	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R15 TDI plus	LMP1	394	3rd	3rd
2011	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R18 TDI	LMP1	14	DNF	DNF
2012	Audi Sport Team Joest	Allan McNish Rinaldo Capello	Audi R18 e-tron quattro	LMP1	377	2nd	2nd
2013	Audi Sport Team Joest	Allan McNish Loïc Duval	Audi R18 e-tron quattro	LMP1	348	1st	1st
2014	Audi Sport Team Joest	Marc Gené Lucas di Grassi	Audi R18 e-tron quattro	LMP1-H	376	2nd	2nd

Tom Kristensen's helmet.

Complete 12 Hours of Sebring results

Kristensen driving the Audi R15 TDI which led him to a fifth win at Sebring.

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1999	BMW Motorsport Schnitzer Motorsport	Jörg Müller JJ Lehto	BMW V12 LMR	LMP	313	1st	1st
2000	Audi Sport North America	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP	360	1st	1st
2001	Audi Sport North America	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP900	370	2nd	2nd
2002	Audi Sport North America	Frank Biela Emanuele Pirro	Audi R8	LMP900	327	5th	5th
2003	Team Bentley	Guy Smith Rinaldo Capello	Bentley Speed 8	LMGTP	362	4th	2nd
2005	ADT Champion Racing	JJ Lehto Marco Werner	Audi R8	LMP1	361	1st	1st
2006	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	349	1st	1st
2007	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	353	4th	2nd
2008	Audi Sport North America	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R10 TDI	LMP1	351	3rd	1st
2009	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R15 TDI	LMP1	383	1st	1st
2011	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R15 TDI plus	LMP1	327	4th	4th
2012	Audi Sport Team Joest	Rinaldo Capello Allan McNish	Audi R18 TDI	LMP1	325	1st	1st
2013	Audi Sport Team Joest	Allan McNish Lucas di Grassi	Audi R18 e-tron quattro	P1	364	2nd	2nd

Complete Petit Le Mans results

Complete International Formula 3000 results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete Japanese Formula 3000/Formula Nippon results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete British Touring Car Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position – 1 point awarded all races) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap – 1 point awarded all races) (* signifies that driver lead feature races for at least one lap – 1 point awarded)

Complete Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters results

(key)

¹ – A non-championship one-off race was held in 2004 at the streets of Shanghai, China.

• † — Retired, but was classified as he completed 90 per cent of the winner's race distance.

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

Other Notable Results