Le Mans, France -- England's Derek Bell faithfully returns to Le Mans, France, every June.

For 24 years he has come to this city in the Loire Valley.

Today, he looks me in the eye, and in his very British accent, tells me quite frankly:

"I come for the affairs."

I blink.

"When I've finished, there have been times when I've needed intravenous drips in my arm and massages to bring back the circulation in my legs and my neck," he says.

And then Derek Bell laughs. What he is talking about is his love affair, his unquenched desire for the 24 hours of Le Mans, an endurance race he has won five times, and the people who come here to watch it.

Mr. Bell, a 53-year-old blond with intense, steel blue eyes, has flirtations with fans from inside his race car during the race.

"It is absolutely astonishing," says Mr. Bell, who will drive here again next weekend in a Gulf-Kremer-Porsche. "We go howling along at 160 mph and the people are there. You can actually see the people.

"Not their faces, but clumps of color and they wave and you wave back and flash your lights and you get to know them. You see them to your left and your right and you see their animation.

"They're leaning over the fences from their houses or perched on unlikely banks and they're waving, always waving. Every time. For hours. And if you don't wave back, you sense how offended they are and they move off."

And then another group comes and a new affair begins.

At night, of course, they disappear. But in their place comes a new romance.

Flash bulbs sparkle all along the route from Le Mans to the smaller towns of Mulsanne and Arnage and back. The carnival lights of Ferris wheels, of cheap thrill shows and bumper-car rides from the track-side fair come into view just before the curve known as the Tertre Rouge. The drivers look up into the sky and see the Goodyear blimp lighted up like Times Square, displaying the car numbers and names of the men leading each of the four classes in the field of competition.

"As the night goes on, though, it becomes very personal," says Mr. Bell. "You are going down the straight at 235-245 and it is just you, the lights on the --board and the soft noise from the engine. You hold the wheel as if it was a lover and you are totally wrapped up in her and in what you are doing together. You are silently coaxing her to give just a little more.

"You don't have that, that feeling, that relationship anywhere else in the world."

If not for this race, which will run Saturday and next Sunday, and the fascination so many have for it, Le Mans probably would be ignored by tourists.

It is surrounded by beautiful places. By the castle-filled Loire Valley, by Normandy and Brittany.

A crossroad on the highway to all those places, Le Mans, halfway between Paris and Nantes, often gets passed by.

;/ Yet for those who stop there are pleasures.

Sights to see

In June, of course, there is the race on the 8.5-mile track just south of town that includes city streets and country roads. But visitors here can also find several small jewels to fill an afternoon.

First there is the Cathedral of St. Jean, something of an architectural marvel. It is huge and dark and wondrous. Built over five centuries, beginning in the 11th, it is Romanesque and Gothic, and inside the support pillars appear so tall as to stretch from earth all the way to heaven.

And then there is Le Mans' old town.

It sits on a hill above the hustle of the main city. The Cathedral of St. Julien towers over the enclave of small, 14th- and 15th-century houses and a quiet square.

Because the old town is not the center of what is now modern Le Mans, it is not overrun with souvenir shops -- or maybe it's not overrun with souvenir shops because it's not overrun with tourists.

Some of the houses date to the 11th century. The cold-gray Gallo-Roman walls which surround the old town -- and may well be what keeps it from tumbling into the Sarthe River -- are the best preserved in Europe. They are amazing, given the date of their construction, between A.D. 280 and 310.

The quiet old city stands in sharp contrast to the Le Mans of the 1990s and its international endurance race, which is, in truth, more than just a race.

It is 71 years of tradition and history. And it is personal, for drivers, the town and the fans, who swell the 151,000 community by more than 300,000 during race week.

"When I was just a kid, we'd take the train here," says Marc Sonnery, who grew up outside Paris, now lives in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., but can't resist the urge to come back for the race. "It was always magic. The Germans party, the English, 20,000 to 30,000 of them, wave their flags all night. You find people sleeping in the most amazing places. And the most amazing things happen.

"I remember one race, [six-time winner] Jacky Ickx lost the race in the pits because a fireman walked slowly in front of his car and he had to stop and wait. He lost by a quarter mile."

The people who live around this course are prisoners of the race. For four days they can not leave or go to their homes when the race cars on the track are practicing and racing.

But it is not so much a hardship, as a much-anticipated occasion.

"It is my biggest headache," says track public relations director Jean Marc Desnues. "The people never complain, because they get free tickets to the race every day for their families.

"But their families -- suddenly the grandpapa, the grandchildren, the cousin of a great-great aunt and the great-great aunt, all live in the small house by the track."

He smiles.

"We make a chat and adjust," Mr. Desnues said. "Otherwise, all of France could be here."

As it is, the event generates about 520 million French francs for Sarthe, the part of France in which Le Mans is located.

"It is our life," said one store clerk, in the town that has been hit hard by a declining French economy.

The race, in fact, is life itself to many, both economically and emotionally.

Nearly every great driver has tested himself at Le Mans. Formula One champion Graham Hill, American legend A. J. Foyt, Italian master Hene Bugatti. They all have come and won. Others have come and lost, but winner, loser or fan each is drawn back to the town 90 miles southwest of Paris.

Movies have not always been kind to motor racing. Racing in general has not translated well on the screen, and scripts are often more cliche than reality.

But the movie classic "Le Mans" is an exception. In it there is an exchange between actress Elga Andersen and Steve McQueen which expresses, with surprising clarity just how committed men have been to this dangerous, uncompromising competition called Le Mans.

"If you risk your life for something, shouldn't it be important?" she asks.

"It better be," says McQueen.

And when she wonders what makes driving faster than anyone else important, he adds:

"A lot of people go through life doing things badly. Racing is important to men who do it well. When you're racing it's life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting."

Better than the movie

It sounds incredibly poetic and, after all, it is a movie script. But there are scenes and stories at Le Mans no movie can touch.

There are the drivers like Mr. Bell, who speak with their own poetry.

"I absolutely hate this race and yet I can't stay away," he says. "It's a fascination -- like Indianapolis and Wimbledon, there is nothing else like it.

"And every time I finish, I say never again. It fills me with terror. It's dangerous. It makes me crazy, staying up all night, driving on adrenalin.

"And yet the thought of being here and not driving -- or not being here at all -- is absolutely impossible to accept. So here I am, driving again, and driving this time in a car that I think has a very good chance at winning."

There are the fans, thousands who come to watch and become part of the culture that is Le Mans.

They are found climbing muddy banks along the track for a good look; strolling down boutique row, shopping the clothing shops of Hermes and Bugatti; nowhere else in the world can be found such a contrasting scene of race fans and high fashion.

The fans can be seen munching perfectly made crepes smothered in Grand Marnier, and napping along-side a metal race-course barrier, their heads pillowed by a vibrating post that signals them to the approach of the cars racing toward the end of a midnight practice or on through the night.

And there is the palpable longing of men whose time has come and gone here, but who can not purge this race at Le Mans from their hearts.

In 1957, Henri Perrier was 31 years old when he came to race here in the 750 cc Class in a DB Panhard.

"The woman whose chateau I was staying in lectured me all week about the dangers of Le Mans," Mr. Perrier says. "She spoke of my wife and children and of how crazy I must be to do this. Finally, on the morning of the race, she drove me into the woods near her chateau, where there was a Madonna shrine by a large tree. She made me get out, and she told me exactly what to say.

"I asked the Madonna to bless and protect me and told her if she would give me a good place [finish], that I would promise never to race at Le Mans again."

That night, Mr. Perrier survived a crash by squeezing his car between two that were spinning -- "I was so scared my legs went like this," he says, shaking his legs back and forth.

He won his class. At age 68, he can say he has kept his promise. Despite offers in the following years, he never again raced here.

But even now there is a sadness about him as he walks the pits, reminiscing with friends and growing visibly excited as he looks at the race cars.

"Ah, how I would like to get in one of these cars and test my skills again at Le Mans," he says.

And there can be no response.

There is only Le Mans, a quiet town whose claim to fame is an endurance race that turns competitors into suitors and visitors into mystified fans.

IF YOU GO . . .

Getting there:

To get to Le Mans, take a plane to Paris. For TWA flights from BWI, round-trip air fare is listed at $650, but cheaper fares may be available through travel agent. From Paris, trains run frequently to Le Mans. If you decide to drive from Paris (about two hours), book rental cars before leaving, for the best rates.

Race tickets:

Tickets for the race cost 150 francs (about $30) at the turns, 280 francs (about $56) in the large enclosed area. Tickets for a practice session during the week cost 80 francs ($16). For ticket availability and more information, contact the Automobile Club de l'Ouest, by phone: 43-72-50-25; fax: 43-72-69-83.