page_title: 1933 24 Hours of Le Mans
section_title: Morning
hierarchical_section_title: 1933 24 Hours of Le Mans / Race / Morning
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: L'accident d'Odette Siko aux 24 Heures du Mans 1933.
context_page_description: The 1933 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 11th Grand Prix of Endurance. It took place at the Circuit de la Sarthe on 17 and 18 June 1933. Up against five strong privateer entries from Alfa Romeo, the opposition looked fairly weak, mostly being of 1920s vintage. There was a strong British contingent in the smaller classes. The big drawcard was the presence of top European drivers Louis Chiron and Tazio Nuvolari. The current European champion was paired with one of the previous year's winners, Raymond Sommer
  From the start, the Italian cars set a strong pace. Sommer broke the track-record several times building a two-minute lead over the Alfas of Chiron, Lewis, Chinetti and Moll. He had lapped the rest of the field by the end of the second hour. Chiron was delayed by an intransigent starter unit, but his co-driver Franco Cortese drove hard to bring the car back up to second going into the night. Most of the other large-engine contenders had fallen away, allowing Odette Siko in a 1.8-litre supercharged Alfa Romeo to move up to fifth. The British teams of Aston Martin, Riley and MG filled out the back end of the top-10.
context_section_description: If the spectators thought the Saturday racing was routine the Sunday proved to be one of the most thrilling days of endurance motor-racing. At 4.30am, as dawn was breaking and early into his stint, Nuvolari bought the lead Alfa in with a broken fender and leaking petrol. The quarter-hour needed to fix it cost them two laps and allowed the other Alfas to overtake them. The lead was then strongly contested between the Alfas of Chiron/Cortese and Chinetti/Gunzberg, with each car taking an advantage depending on their respective pit cycles.
  At 6am the Bugatti, having dropped to eighth and 14 laps in arrears, came to the pits in a cloud of steam and smoke so large it was mistakenly thought to be on fire. Just before 7am a brief shower swept the track. Odette Siko was caught out on the fast approach to Indianapolis. Going off the road she was flung out as the car ricocheted off the trees so violently that two fell onto the track, partially blocking it. The car rolled and caught fire. Landing on a policeman, she was taken to hospital under observation, with a broken wrist and minor burns.
  One of the first cars coming past was the little Austin. It had been running virtually without a clutch for most of the race at the back of the field. Unable to stop, Metchim struggled through the tree-debris but doing so broke a steering link. Without a spare on board, he was forced to retire. Soon after, Roger Labric, who had been in and out of the pits with the Lorraine-Dietrich, finally parked it with irreparable clutch problems. Bertelli, running sixth, pitted his Aston Martin at 7.30  to secure his fenders that were coming adrift – a delay that cost time and a position. As the bigger cars had their issues, the Riley of Peacock/van der Becke kept running like clockwork and picking up places. Eighth at dawn became sixth by 7am and then an impressive fourth by midday.
  Nuvolari was driving very fast now and passed Gunzberg around 7.30. By 8am he had reduced Cortese's lead to 3​¹⁄₂ minutes and kept whittling it down to overtake him on the pit-straight before 9am, when the leaders had completed 185 laps. Sommer took over at the next pitstop, continuing the hard charge and breaking the lap record yet again. At 10am Cortese was somersaulted off the road just after Indianapolis because of a collapsed wheel bearing. He limped back to the pits, but the chassis was too misaligned to continue. Chiron was furious, Cortese disconsolate. The MG J-type of Gordon Hendy had started quickly, well ahead of its 100 km/h target. Then it had a misfire (cured by changing the sparkplugs) and a leak in its fuel-tank. The team resorted to chewing-gum and cardboard to plug the split. However, late in the morning it was stopped on the Hunaudières Straight with a terminal crankcase breakage.
  With a two-lap lead over Chinetti/Gunzberg, things were looking positive for Sommer to get back-to-back victories. The British Alfa kept circulating regularly in third, waiting for the two in front to break.
caption: The remains of Odette Siko's Alfa Romeo
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