Michael Fassbender is going to Le Mans to drive bends fast

Do not adjust your sets, Michael Fassbender - he of X-Men and general red carpet fame - will contest the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June having made the entry list for the fabled endurance race.

Fassbender will be driving the #93 Porsche 911 RSR-19 for the Proton Competition team alongside Matt Campbell and a third driver yet to be named, competing in a GTE Am field that also features *checks notes* three-time F1 race winner Giancarlo Fisichella.

Stiff competition then. In truth this isn’t completely alien territory for the German-Irish actor, who began racing on the Ferrari Challenge scene in 2017 and later progressed to the European Le Mans Series, where he’s managed a couple of podiums to date.

And no, this isn’t an extremely method way of preparing to emulate Steve McQueen’s 1971 Le Mans cinema classic. That we know of, anyway.

Of course, long-time viewers of TG TV will remember that Fassbender once enjoyed the tutelage of The Stig, way back when in 2012. Feel old yet?

This isn’t the first time someone known for things other than racing has taken on one of the most gruelling endurance races on the planet: remember cyclist Chris Hoy entering the LMP2 class? That was the same year World Cup-winning former goalkeeper (football, before you ask) Fabien Barthez made his second of three appearances at La Sarthe…

The rest of the field has also taken shape. Five cars will line-up in the top tier Hypercar category; two apiece from Toyota and Glickenhaus, the other from Alpine. Then there are 27 LMP2 cars, seven GTE Pros and 23 GTE Ams.

Remember it’s 2023 and 2024 where the battle for victory looks set to get more intense: BMW, Cadillac, Alpine and Aston Martin are among the marques to be pursuing or actively considering future entries. Who’s your money on?