After a sunny week, race-day was overcast, but dry with a huge crowd in attendance for the start. At the drop of the flag it was Stommelen, with a big power-slide, who was first under the Dunlop bridge. In yet another deadly year of motorsport Jacky Ickx, mindful of the accident that had ended the career of his former teammate Willy Mairesse's on the first lap of the previous year's race staged his own one-man protest. He rebelled against the traditional Le Mans starting procedure to run across the track to their cars, climb in, start the car, and move the car as quickly as possible to pull away from the grid. Instead Ickx walked slowly to his car, properly put on his safety belts, and only then moved the car. Doing so effectively relegated Ickx to the back of the starting grid.