Lietz Praises Manthey’s “Trust” After Back-to-Back Wins

Richard Lietz paid tribute to Manthey’s “trust” to have him be part of the German team’s FIA World Endurance Championship LMGT3 effort after he captured a second consecutive class win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, admitting the call to join the program came at a time he was considering winding down his driving career.

Lietz, Ryan Hardwick and Riccardo Pera took a commanding class victory aboard the No. 92 Porsche 911 GT3 R on Sunday, finishing half a minute clear of the nearest car in the LMGT3 class after leading a sizeable chunk of the contest.

For the 41-year-old, the win was his sixth in the GT ranks at the French endurance classic, adding to previous triumphs in 2007, 2010, 2013, 2022 and 2024.

Notably, the four most recent wins have all been affiliated with Porsche stalwarts Manthey, who operated the factory GTE-Pro program with which claimed victories in 2013 and 2022.

After that program came to a close at the end of 2022, Lietz took a year out from the FIA World Endurance Championship before returning to form part of Manthey’s newly launched LMGT3 effort.

He promptly went on to secure a fifth Le Mans win alongside Yasser Shahin and Morris Schuring and repeated that feat on Sunday with Hardwick and Pera.

Speaking in the post-race press conference, Lietz expressed his gratitude to Manthey for pushing to have him included in its LMGT3 plans, as he admitted it came at a time he was considering calling time on his driving career.

“First of all, you have to be very old to be able to win it six times,” said Lietz. “That’s the issue.

“No, I was lucky enough [for this] to be [my] 19th time here with Porsche. Always as a factory driver and basically every year since 2007.

“Le Mans has been really good to me with six victories here now and the first time back to back.

“Manthey last year trusted me, it was already at the stage of my driver career towards the end and I was thinking of stopping and then they said I had to come back.

“In the end now, two years later, two more Le Mans victories. So I’m happy that they asked me and gave me the trust and the chance.

“Together with my teammates now with Ryan and Ricky, this year we really had the luck on our side that there was not so many safety cars and quite a green race basically a bit like the Le Mans spirit from the past, I would say.

“We had a fast car, it was really amazing with the triple stint with the tires at the end, this was the key.

“Also Ryan, who did really amazing lap times, which were not canceled by a safety car. I think this is one of the reasons why you race in WEC and not in America.”