Inside the British race team eyeing historic McLaren Le Mans glory 30 years since win

McLaren - Say the name and you think of one of Britain's epochal sportscar brands and one of the most successful Formula One teams in history. James Hunt, Ayrton Senna, Mika Hakkinen and Lewis Hamilton are among the team’s World Champion roll call over the past 50 years.

Off track, McLaren Automotive has a booming sportscar market with close to five million models sold annually. The 750S, 570GT and Artura are among its most successful recent designs. However, the brand’s first step into road car design came over thirty years going with the McLaren F1 hypercar rolling off forecourts in 1992. The first production road car to exceed 200mph, the McLaren F1 became a poster car for the ages and embarked on an ambitious challenge three years later by attempting to conquer the famous 24 Hours of Le Mans motor race.

The newcomers turned up to the classic French enduro, beat the odds and took victory with the F1-GTR. It’s the first and only time a road-based supercar has won the famous race in its over 100-year history.

30 years on from that surprise success, McLaren is back with a British racing squad hoping to mark the occasion in the best possible way.

Step in United Autosports, a Wakefield-based racing outfit who have risen from treading water in the European racing circus to the top step of world motorsport in just 15 years.

“It’s a massive deal isn’t it in terms of the anniversary, To do it then would be incredible. It doesn't even bear thinking about”, says Charlie Kemp, Project Manager.

After securing two Le Mans 24 Hour Wins in 2020 and 2024 operating Oreca-Gibson LMP2 chassis, United partnered with McLaren for the World Endurance Championship’s new LMGT3 class last season.

The race squad, owned by McLaren boss Zak Brown, started life slowly in 2024 but still secured a top ten in the final standings.

A year on, United means business and is targeting a famous milestone win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans next month.

Speaking to the Express at Imola’s WEC round, Charlie added: “I mean that's what we’re trying to do. It certainly wouldn’t be easy, but it's everyone in the team's dream, it's the challenge. Trying to win the championship outright and trying to win Le Mans. Some people would probably take winning Le Mans over winning the full championship, for me we’ve got to try and do both.

“Without a doubt, that is a dream, not only of mine but all of the drivers in the team and every single member of the team.”

United Autosports started 2025 strongly, picking up second place at the season-opening Qatar 1812kms in February. However, the team failed to capitalise on an average qualifying position at Imola with both cars finishing outside the points.

United’s star driver James Cottingham is optimistic of success in June and highlights the importance of that big 30th anniversary.

He said: “Yeah absolutely, I think we are way stronger than we were last year, Last year there was quite a big nostalgic moment because it was 29 years since the win at Le Mans in 95’. But this year really is such a milestone. I feel we are much better prepared.

"The team’s really strong, the car’s really strong, just everything seems to be falling into place. I'm really confident about it and really looking forward to it.”

Could winning Le Mans in 2025 with McLaren be considered among United Autosports greatest achievements? It’s certainly up there. After years of running LMP2 machinery, the team’s switch to LMGT3 was an effective reset for the British brand.

The team openly accepts that securing the McLaren project weeks before the start of 2024 left the team on the backstep but they’ve been fighting back ever since.

Charlie added: “What have been the biggest challenges? In terms of when we got the green light to actually do this in 2024 it was relatively late on. To get everything together, get everything sorted and try and adhere to all of these new regulations and get the package together, a lot of that was down to McLaren's hard work.

"Ultimately would I have liked more testing going into 2024, I mean without a shadow of a doubt, but ultimately time dictates it, budget dictates it and the fact that ultimately you need to be in Qatar for the first round in late February.

“It’s not straightforward. The first season was without a doubt a challenge, as I'm sure you can look at in terms of results we just continued to get better. It was very hard initially. I'm not going to lie.”

McLaren F1’s hypercar broke the history books in 1995 and has gone down in history since. Could it be the turn of the latest generation of McLaren 570 GTS machines to do the same?

Race star Cottingham simply adds: “We’ve got to do it, we've got to do it.”