User:Reattacollector/sandbox

Toyota at the 24 Hours of LeMans
For decades, Japanese automobile manufacturer Toyota consistently experienced misfortune at the 24 Hours of LeMans. Toyota initially struggled to be competitive in the event, not finding success until the TS010 prototype finished in second behind the Peugeot 905 in 1992. Afterwards, Toyota often found themselves seemingly poised for victory, only for their cars to be knocked out of first place by mechanical problems or road hazards late in the race. The first instance was the next year, when Toyota was leading heading into the next morning, only for all three TS010s to experience mechanical breakdown, leading to Toyota finishing 4-5-6. Similarly in 1994|, a Toyota TS010 was in first place with only 90 minutes to go but a failed gear linkage caused it drop to third behind two Porsches. It was able to regain second place, while another TS010 that was in fourth was knocked out of the race entirely by transmission failure. When Toyota returned in 1998 with the GT-One, it experienced multiple mechanical breakdowns and only finished 8th. |The next year, the GT-One had a better showing; a model being driven by Ukyo Katayama set the fastest lap that year and seemed poised to challenge the leading BMW V12 LMR, but a tire blowout late in the race allowed the BMW's lead to become insurmountable and Toyota again finished second. Toyota then took a 12 year sabbatical, returning in 2012 with the TS030 Hybrid, but the curse returned as all of the TS030s were derailed by crashes in both 2012 and 2013 - In 2013, a TS030 that was challenging the leading Audi R18 e-tron quattro for first aquaplaned into the barriers, giving the Audi an insurmountable lead and Toyota finished in second yet again.