People

Jean-Claude Lefebvre

Jean-Claude Lefebvre was one of the early kart racers in France, becoming a member of the national team in 1965 at the age of 18. At the time he was studying at a commercial school in Neuilly, a Paris suburb, where one of his fellow pupils was a youngster called Jean Todt. The two were friends and when Lefebvre did his first rally in 1967, Todt was his co-driver. He chose rallying because it was easier to get into the sport by that route. He also tried circuit racing, competing in the Renault 8 Gordini series. He first made his mark driving in an Alpine on the Tour de France in 1970 and this led to a drive with Ford France in 1971, rallying Escorts and Capris.

After six months, however, he had to do his French military service and when he re-emerged a year later he was an unknown once again. He got hold of a Ford Escort and started hillclimbing and in 1974 won the touring car class in the French National Championship. A friend lent him a Porsche for the 1975 Tour de France and he set some impressive times ahead of Bernard Darniche's Lancia Stratos. As a result he was recruited by Peugeot to do African rallies in 1976 with the Peugeot 104. The following year, while continuing his Peugeot program in Africa, he raced a Peugeot 104 in the French National Rallycross series, finishing runner-up. He also competed in ice-racing, winning at Serre Chevalier. In the late 1970s he rallied and co-drove for Peugeot - navigating Jean-Pierre Nicholas to victory on the Safari Rally in 1978. He was also reunited with his old school friend Jean Todt when the pair competed on the Tour de Corse in 1977.

Peugeot was cutting back on its rallying at the time and so in 1981 Lefebvre found himself with a drive in the French Touring Car Championship as team-mate to former Grand Prix driver Jean-Pierre Beltoise. Jean-Claude finished fifth in the French Championship. At the end of the year - at the age of 34 - he retired from competition. He did not have a car to race or rally in 1982 and decided it was time to get "a proper job".

In 1981 Peugeot merged with Talbot and it was decided to establish a new sporting department called Peugeot Talbot Sport. The director was to be Jean Todt and he decided that Lefebvre would be a good press officer for his new team and convinced Peugeot-Talbot's PR chief Corrado Provera to sign him up. He has been there ever since, acting as the PR officer for Peugeot's competition department.

The first program was rallying with the Peugeot 205 T16 which led to three World titles by 1986. Then PTS turned to rally raids and won the Paris-Dakar for four consecutive years and was twice victorious at Pike's Peak.

In 1991 PTS turned its attention to sportscars and won the World title and Le Mans the following year and adding an historic 1-2-3 in the classic event in 1993. For 1994 Peugeot entered F1 with McLaren and Lefebvre stayed with the Peugeot F1 programme until the company withdrew from the sport at the end of 2000 after which he went back to the Peugeot World Rally Championship team.