For their third Le Mans, Flying Lizard set out to create something special...

The works of Andy Warhol, Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, and Alexander Calder have a common thread in motorsports: each of these famous artists has designed an "art car" to compete in the 24 Heures du Mans, the annual 24-hour sports car test of endurance held in Le Mans, France.

Hervé Poulain, an auctioneer and gentleman racing driver from France, is credited for the art car concept. In 1975, his friend, American artist Alexander Calder, was the first to transform a sports car into a piece of art: Poulain's own personal BMW 3.0 CSL.

Once the Calder-designed BMW appeared, the concept of automobiles as mobile canvases for expression captured the imagination of other famous artists of the era and the Le Mans art car tradition began.

The Flying Lizard project
For their third Le Mans, Flying Lizard set out to create something special for the 2007 24 Heures du Mans. The team selected Troy Lee, a well-known California based motorsport artist, to create a custom livery for the Flying Lizard No. 80 Porsche. The Lizards worked together with Troy and his team in Southern California to make the team's definitive Lizard icon come alive on the 911 GT3 RSR Porsche.

"I started by thinking about the Lizard's character and looked to the color and texture of real lizards for inspiration. I think a racecar should be colorful and interesting and look like it's travelling 200 mph even while it is standing still. The Porsche is a pretty aggressive car with a high and wide profile -- it was a perfect surface on which to bring the Lizard to life."

Flying Lizard kept the Porsche livery a secret on site at Le Mans, creating the car during the weekend before Scrutineering, which was scheduled the Monday of race week. The car was created in the team's Le Mans garage by ShowTrax International using a full vinyl wrap.

On site in Le Mans for the event, Troy Lee added custom details to the design using chrome and color to add dimension to the Lizard as it wrapped over the car front to back. Troy added, "I love working on concepts like the Flying Lizard Porsche livery. I wanted the art car to have a 3-D look by using chrome to give it some depth so the car looks different from all sides. The history of Le Mans is so important to racing and Steve McQueen and the LeMans movie were a huge inspiration to me as an artist in motorsports, I remember watching it as a little kid with my dad. Designing the car was one thing, but seeing the car realized in full scale there on track at Le Mans was incredible - it was a dream accomplishment as an artist."

On Monday, June 11, the team unveiled the custom livery at Scrutineering in the historic town of Le Mans to the cheers of thousands of sports car fans.

The 24-hour endurance contest began the afternoon of June 14. This was the team's third consecutive Le Mans competition and hopes for a podium were high. The car had been fast in practice, and the experienced driver lineup of Joerg Bergmeister ,Johannes van Overbeek and Seth Neiman were ready for the challenge. Unfortunately, a podium was not to be for the team - the car was retired after 10 hours because of a mechanical failure that could not be repaired.

The Troy Lee-designed livery ran only once at the 2007 24 Heures du Mans. The team returned it to its standard red and silver livery to complete the remainder of the American Le Mans Series season as the No. 45.

2007 Le Mans Image Gallery
To view our 2007 Le Mans image gallery, click here and then choose the "24 Heures du Mans 2007" gallery.