"The 24 Hours of Le Mans have always been special for me because someone in my family worked on the movie 'Le Mans' with Steve McQueen," explained Alexander Wurz. "Still, I was not supposed to be on the entry list of the 1996 Le Mans 24 Hours. Reinhold Joest, team-owner of Joest Racing, was looking for a driver and after a test session, he decided to trust a young guy to drive the TWR Porsche. It was a tough fight with the official Porsche; at 8am on Sunday morning, we were leading with an eight-second margin, but we finally won."

What the BMX World Champion didn't know at this point is that his victory would dramatically change his life. Two days after the race, he was offered a two-day test session in F1. He put in the best time, which gave him another opportunity to test the car. He finally became a F1 driver, which was great news because at 21, he had no money and was about to give up his racing career.

Following Davy Jones, Manuel Reuter and Alex Wurz' victory in 1996, Reinhold Joest decided that combining two experienced drivers and a young gun was the key to success at Le Mans; this is why the former race driver hired Tom Kristensen in 1997. What a smart decision! Both Alexander Wurz and Tom Kristensen won as rookies and they now joke about the beginning of their career. The Dane pretends he would have liked to be an F1 driver while the Austrian driver wishes he was a nine-time winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

For now, Alex Wurz scored two victories already, the last one in 2009 with Peugeot and the first one in 1996. At this time, he was still a kid and his first thought was: "it is too easy to win Le Mans!"

Cécile Bonardel / ACO

PHOTO: LE MANS (SARTHE, FRANCE), PLACE DE LA REPUBLIQUE, 24 HOURS OF LE MANS, MONDAY 8 JUNE 2015, SCRUTINEERING. Alexander Wurz at scrutineering on Monday.