Tag Archives: IMSA

Ground Effect Silhouette – Porsche 935 JLP-4

Born Hans Johan to Dutch parents who settled in Muncie, Indiana John Lee Paul won a Harvard Scholarship before making his fortune managing mutual funds.

From the early 60’s until 1976 John raced sporadically and showed a good turn of speed by taking several class victories driving a Porsche 550 RS and there after a Chevrolet Corvette.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

In 1977 John competed in the IMSA GTO class with a Porsche 911 Careera RS and a Dekon built Chevrolet Monza, the following season he moved up to competing in the IMSA GTX class with a Protofab built Corvette and later his first Porsche 935 which became JLP-1.

The of the highlights of his 1978 season was winning the Daytona Six Hour race for production cars driving a Mazda RX2 shared with Jim Downing another was a class win with Dick Barbour and Brian Redman at Le Mans in Dicks Porsche 935.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, John Fitzpatrick, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

For 1979 John ran the ever more modified JLP-1 in both the IMSA and SCCA Trans=Am series winning 6 races in the latter.

The following year he split his time between, running in Preston Henn’s Porsche 935 K3 in the States and his own modified K3 which became JLP-2 in Europe, until after the Le Mans 24 Hours where he Guy Edwards and son John Paul Jnr finished 9th.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

JLP-2 then returned to the States for the remainder of the 1980 season where father and son recorded a win at Road America.

For 1982 JLP racing ran a new Gaaco built 935 JLP-3, in which Jnr won at Potland and Daytona at the season’s end, and a Chevy powered Lola T600 which finished only once, 3rd at Sears Point, from six starts.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

By now John Paul Snr had commissioned Lee Dykstra to design and Fabcar to build the ultimate no expense spared Porsche 935 silhouette race car seen in these photograph’s at Goodwood Festival of Speed with John Fitzpatrick at the wheel.

JLP-4, unlike all other Porsche 935’s, was built with a monocoque chassis and a subframe to hold the 840 hp twin turbo 3.2 litre / 195 cui flat six motor.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, John Fitzpatrick, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

Lee Dykstra with the aid of the Lockheed wind tunnels managed to incorporate aerodynamic venturi into the chassis as first seen in a racing application on Colin Chapman’s 1978 Lotus 79.

Rolf Stommelen joined the Pauls in JPL-3 to win the 1982 Daytona 24 hour race before Jnr and Snr shared the same car to win the 12 Hour Sebring race.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

Jnr then drove to a solo victory in JLP-3 at Road Atlanta, another in the T600 at Laguna Secca before jumping back into JLP-3 to share a victory with his Dad at Charlotte.

The $750,000 (US Dollars Seven Hundred and Fifty Thousand) JLP-4 was ready for it’s debut at Brainerd and after qualifying 2nd Jnr came home first, 17 seconds ahead of Danny Ongias who was followed by team patron Ted Field both driving a Lola T600’s.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, John Fitzpatrick, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

At Portland, the cars second appearance, Jnr qualified on pole and won by 37 seconds from Ted Field, this turned out to be the last victory for the car which was damaged in testing.

The Pauls meanwhile notched up 2 more victories in JLP-3 in the 6 hour race at Watkins Glen and at Road Atlanta.

Porsche 935 JLP-4, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

At end of the season Jnr’s eight wins and his seasons other placings were enough for John Paul Jnr aged 22 to be crowned the youngest ever IMSA champion.

JLP-4 appeared twice in 1983 at Daytona for the 24 hours where Jnr and Phil Currin qualified 41st but withdrew and at Road Atlanta where Jnr shared the driving with Rene Rodriguez to come home 6th from 6th on the grid.

By now John Paul Snr was a wanted man, on the run in Switzerland, for shooting a federal drug informant, after serving six months in Switzerland for traveling with false documents he was extradited to the USA where he pleaded guilty to attempted murder for which he served 13 years, while on parole after being questioned about the disappearance of his girl friend John Paul Snr went on the run again, neither he or his girl friend have been seen since.

John Paul Jnr continued racing with some success until he too was imprisoned; for admitting to racketeering, preparing a boat to smuggle drugs from Colombia to Louisiana, three years later he was released and continued racing, winning an IRL race at Texas before being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.

Thanks for joining me on this “Ground Effect Silhouette” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow for Ferrari Friday. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Firing Up Brand Awareness – BMW GTP

The early to mid 1980’s were boom years for many capitalist economies as the price hike in fuel prices provoked by the 1970’s fuel crises became normalised as increased oil production outside the OPEC nations that forced the crises became more economically viable.

In 1983 Nelson Piquet became the first driver to win the World Championship driving a vehicle with a turbo charged motor, his Brabham BT52 being powered by a BMW engine that brought the Bravarian brand much attention, despite Ferrari winning the 1983 Formula One Constructors Championship, in almost all of the global automotive markets except the biggest one in the USA.

BMW GTP, Classic Motor Show, NEC Birmingham

To fire up brand awareness in the USA for the 1986 season BMW tasked McLaren North America to run two BMW North America financed cars in the increasingly popular IMSA GTP series for prototype 2 seat coupé racing cars.

Time and considerable development expense was saved when BMW commissioned March to build four GTP chassis based on the previous race winning March 82G, 83G and 84G GTP prototypes that had been run with Porsche Flat 6, Buick V6 and Chevrolet V8 engines.

BMW GTP, Classic Motor Show, NEC Birmingham

The BMW GTP prototypes, said to have been designed by Gordon Coppuck, were fitted them with 2 litre / 122 cui 4 cylinder 16 valve turbo charged motors and to be driven by American young guns Davy Jones and John Andretti backed up by the more experienced pairing of John Watson and David Hobbs.

During testing for the Daytona one of the cars caught fire and wary of adverse publicity the team withdrew it’s cars from the season opening 24 Hours race.

BMW GTP, Classic Motor Show, NEC Birmingham

A second car burned during qualifying at Sebring and it’s sister was withdrawn after a separate accident, but in the remaining races the cars proved fast, regular top ten qualifiers, but fragile recording 8 did not finishes plus two accidents from 17 starts.

At Watkins Glen the team locked out the front row of the grid and the pole sitting youngsters Davy and John drove their BMW GTP to the models only victory in the Watkins Glen 500 while the sister did not finish.

BMW GTP, Classic Motor Show, NEC Birmingham

At the end of the year BMW announced it’s imminent withdrawal from International motor sport after the BMW powered Brabham F1 team scored only two points and BMW powered vehicles from both series appeared to attract more publicity for catching fire than for racing success.

BMW saw out it’s contract to supply motors to Brabham for one more season and the GTP programme was shut down immediately, although two of the remaining BMW GTP’s, two replacements for the ones that were destroyed were sent to McLaren North America, appeared in 1988 as Buick powered March 86G’s with Gianpiero Moretti’s Momo Racing in 1988.

BMW GTP, Classic Motor Show, NEC Birmingham

The BMW GTP, like the one seen here at last years Classic Motor Show, NEC, Birmingham, should not be confused with the four Group C spec Nissan V6 turbo powered March 86G’s or the IMSA spec Buick V6 turbo powered 86G supplied to Conte Racing all of which were also raced during 1986.

Thanks for joining me on this “Firing Up Market Awareness” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres”, I hope you will join me again for Ferrari Friday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Three Rotor Wankel – Mazda 757 #003

For 1986 the Lucky Strike sponsored Mazdaspeed team employed Nigel Stroud to design a new challenger for Le Mans which was to compete in the IMSA GTP class with a new 3 rotor type 13G Wankel rotary engine rated at 1962 cc / 119 cui.

Three 757 chassis were built #001 was given it’s debut at Suzuka in April 1986 where Yoshimi Katayama, Youjirou Terada and Takashi Yorino finished 6th from 12th on the grid.

#90 URD  David Mercer, Jens Winther, #201 Mazda David Kennedy, Takashi Yorino,  Kouros 1000 Kms Silverstone,

Chassis #002 and today’s featured #003 got their first runs in the Kouros 1000 Kms at Silverstone where Yoshimi Katayama and Youjirou Terada finished 13th overall and first in GTP with chassis #002.

David Kennedy and Takashi Yorino, seen battling with the #90 URD driven by David Mercer, Jens Winther above, came home 19th one spot behind and on the same lap as the #90 URD, both cars being 38 laps behind the winners Jaguar driven by Derek Warwick and Eddie Cheever.

#120 Mazda 757, David Kennedy, Mark Galvin, Pierre Dieudonné, 24 Heures du Mans, Le Mans,

Mazdaspeed took all three of it’s 757’s to Le Mans in 1986, but only used two of them in the race.

Both cars, #003 carrying the #120 race number driven by David Kennedy, Mark Galvin and Pierre Dieudonné and #002 carrying the #121 race number driven by Takashi Yorino, Youjirou Terada and Yoshimi Katayama were bought back to the pits at the end of the race after their gearboxes failed after completing 137 laps and 59 laps respectively.

#120 Mazda 757, David Kennedy, Mark Galvin, Pierre Dieudonné, 24 Heures du Mans, Le Mans,

The 757’s continued to be campaigned in Japan through 1986 where Yoshimi Katayama and Youjirou Terada scored a season high 4th in the 500 km race at Fuji in November.

Following a 1987 season high 4th place finish at the May Fuji 1000 kms for Takashi Yorino and David Kennedy Mazdaspeed returned to Le Mans with three cars one of which, #002, was retained as a spare.

#120 Mazda 757, David Kennedy, Mark Galvin, Pierre Dieudonné, 24 Heures du Mans, Le Mans,

#003 was renumbered possibly with a new chassis #103 and driven by the same David, Mark and Pierre trio as in 1986, but now carrying the #202 race number as seen below.

After starting 28th they finished the race in 7th place overall, first in IMSA, while the new sister chassis #104 carrying the #201 race number driven by the ’86 all Japanese trio of Yoshimi, Youjirou, and Takashi, retired with engine failure after completing just 34 laps.

#202 Mazda 757, David Kennedy, Mark Galvin, Pierre Dieudonné, 24 Heures du Mans, Le Mans,

On it’s return to Japan chassis #003/103 was acquired by Shizumatsu Racing who ran it in Japan during the 1988 and 1989 seasons for Syuuji Fujii, Terumitsu Fujieda, Tetsuji Shiratori, Kaoru Iida and Seisaku Suzuki whose best results were two sixth places during the 1989 season.

Pleasure Racing became the entrant of the car for it’s final season with the drivers Syuuji and Tetsuji being joined by Keiichi Mizutani for one event at Suzuka in September where they finished 14th from 18th on the grid.

Syuuji and Tetsuji rounded out today’s featured cars known career at Fuji in October 1990 with an 8th place finish from 18th on the grid, equaling the 1990 season high finish at the same track in July, from 16th on the grid, when Seisaku was also sharing the driving.

Thanks for joining me on this “Three Rotor Wankel” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looling at a short tailed Alpine. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Anny-Charlotte Ralph And Bob – Porsche 935 K3/80 #009 00030

It is quite perverse to try and write a comprehensive story about today’s featured Porsche 935 chassis #009 00030 which took part in 6 Daytona and 4 Le Mans 24 hour races, winning the former with Bob Garretson, Bobby Rahal and Brian Redman at the wheel in 1981 and hitting headlines around the world when Rolf Stommelen, Dick Barbour and a certain Paul Newman drove the car to a second place finish at Le Mans in 1979 in a single blog, so I will focus on some of the cars highlights, owners and star drivers for now.

Porsche 935 K3/80, Verney, Kent-Cooke, Garretson, Le Mans

Rolf, Dick and Paul proved their result at Le Mans was no fluke when they finished second on the cars second appearance in the ’79 Watkins Glen 6 Hour race.

French driver Anny-Charlotte Verney shared #009 00030 for the first timeApple, on it’s final appearance carrying customer Porsche 935/77A bodywork, with Bob Garretson and Skeeter McKitterick for a 9th place finish in the 1980 Daytona 24 hour race.

At the Sebring 12 Hour race #009 00030 was fitted with Kremer Brothers K3 bodywork which carried sponsorship from Apple Computer and was driven to a 7th place finish by Bob, Bobby Rahal and Canadian Kees Nierop.

At Le Mans in 1980 Bob and Bobby were joined by Australian Alan Moffat to qualify 14th on the grid but piston failure led to the cars only Le Mans retirement after it had completed 134 laps.

After winning the Daytona 24 hours in 1981 the same winning Bob, Bobby and Brian trio finished 17th from 4th on the grid in the 1981 Sebring 12 Hours.

Part owner Bob Garrettson, with Ralph Kent-Wood, stepped back from the driving seat to allow Bobby and Brian to share the wheel to finish 3rd and 4th at Riverside and Laguna Seca.

The #009 00030 was then shipped to Le Mans where owners Bob and Ralph teamed up with British Petrolium (BP) sponsored Anny-Charlotte Verney to set a qualifying time of 3 min 55.150, good enough for 33rd spot on the grid.

Anny-Charlotte sharing the car for the second time with Bob and Ralph drove the car, seen above 23 hours into the race, to 6th place finish.

The car remained competitive for the remainder of the 1981 IMSA season which included a 3rd place finish with Bob, Rick Mears and Johnny Rutherford in the 1981 Watkins Glen 6 hour race.

In 1982 Bob was joined at the wheel of #009 00030 by Columbian Mauricio DeNarvaez and Jeff Wood at Daytona where they finished 3rd in the season opening 24 hours race.

Bob teamed up with Anny-Charlotte for a third time in #009 00030 for the 1982 Le Mans 24 Hours and they were joined by Ray Ratcliff for the cars final Le Mans start, from 43rd on the grid they salvaged an 11th place finish.

Wayne Baker bought #009 00030 for the 1983 season and converted it from twin turbo 935 spec to single turbo 934 spec and ran it with a loose interpretation of 934 bodywork at Daytona where he drove the car with Bob and Jim Mullen to a 9th place finish and in the 1983 Sebring 12 hours where Kees replace Bob and with Wayne and Jim scored the cars second and final outright victory.

At the end of 1983 #009 00030 was returned to full twin turbo 935 K3 spec and on it’s fifth appearance in the Daytona 24 hours was driven by Wayne, Jim and Tom Blackaller to a 5th place finish from 12th on the grid, from the same position on the grid at Sebring the same trio finished a season high 4th.

#009 00030’s final appearance in the Daytona 24 hours was in 1985 when Jack Newsum, Chip Mead and Ren Tilton joined Wayne for a 9th place finish from 28th on the grid.

Midway through 1985 Chester Vincentz bought the car and converted it back to single turbo 934 spec and ran it IMSA GTO events with a 934 type body in 1985 and a hybrid 935 body in 1986 and ’87 as a 930 S.

On the October 4th 1987Chester drove #009 00030 to a 12th place finish from 12th on the grid on the cars 72nd and final known in period appearance.

Thanks for joining me on this Anny-Charlotte, Bob and Ralph edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when Ferrari Friday will be making a month long return. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Jun Jeans – Mazda RX7 253i

Welcome to the first of 26 vehicles that will be featured this month that have either run at, or are of a type that have run in the Le Mans 24 Hour endurance race, I will be featuring these cars every day this month except Wednesday, there will be no prizes for guessing what the featured marque will be on Mazda Monday’s.

In 1979 Mazda ran a single Mazda RX7, also known as a 252i, at the fastest round about in the world for Tetsu Ikuzawa, Youjirou Terada and Claude Buchet but it failed to qualify with a best qualifying time of 4m 18.880 s.

The 252i is thought to have raced at Fuji on at least 3 occasions, but a class win in November ’79, for Youjirou Terada and Nico Nicole, is the only known result.

Mazda RX7, Silverstone 6 Hours,

Three years later today’s featured car the RX7 253i made it’s debut sans 252i type rear wing at the 1981 Silverstone 6 Hours, as seen in these photographs, where it was driven to a IMSA GTU class win and 8th place overall finish from 23rd on the grid by Youjirou Terada and Win Percy.

Youjirou and Win were joined by Hiroshi Fushida at Le Mans in 1981 where they out qualified a Domon sponsored sister car driven by Tom Walkinshaw, Pete Lovett and Tetsu Ikuzawa with a 49th best time of 4:04.790 against the 51st best time of 4:07.180 achieved by the Domon sponsored drivers.

Neither 253i finished the race the Jun (Jeans not Speed Shop) sponsored car retired after completing 25 laps with a rear axle problem while the Donon sponsored car retired with a rotary engine problem.

Mazda RX7, Youjirou Terada / Win Percy, Silverstone 6 Hours,

253i’s were raced in Japan until 1986 by teams that included Kinomi Racing, Team Speed Shop Seven, Yours Sport, Alpha Cubic Racing Team, Mishima Auto Hanbai, Capris Enterprise,TRS Itabashi, Koyata Engei Racing and AMRC teams.

The best known results for the model are three second place overall finishes for Tony Trimmer and Nico Nicole at Suzuka in August 1981, at Fuji 1000kms in July 1982 for the Alpha Cubic Racing Team trio Chiyomi Totani, Kaoru Iida and Keiichi Suzuki and finally for the Aqua Motors Club No.3 drivers Chikage Oguchi and Takashi Yorino in the November 1982 Fuji 500 kms.

In 1982 Mazda built an even more radical body for a pair RX7 254i’s for Le Mans and got one of two cars entered to a 14th place finish at Le Mans with Youjirou, Takashi Yorino and Australian Allan Moffat sharing the driving.

Thanks for joining me on this “Jun Jeans” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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IMSA King Elvis – Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo #88-01

According to the results available to me Don Devendorf a “scientist” at the Hughes Aircraft Corporation was campaigning a Triumph Spitfire and then Mueller Fabricators Triumph GT6 in the GP and EP SCCA classes with some success from 1968 to 1970.

By 1978 Don had founded Electramotive Engineering of California with John Knepp to prepare and successfully race a succession of Datsun’s.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

Starting with a IMSA GTU Class 240Z before moving onto GTU Class 280ZX and GTO Class 280ZX turbo models up until 1984.

In 1985 Nissan decided to drop the Datsun brand in favour of Nissan and entered into a partnership with Electramotive to field cars in the top GTP class of the IMSA series.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

From 1985 Electramotive used Lola chassis similar to the Lola T710 chassis used by General Motors Corvette GTP team but adapted to take the Electramotive tuned turbocharged Nissan VG30 V6.

Initially the Nissan variant of the Lola T710 was known as the T810 in 1985, but for 1986 and 1987 the cars were known as Nissan GTP ZX-turbo’s with Lola T710 chassis numbers.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

The Nissan Lola chassis carried bodywork devised by Yoshi Suzuka which was easily distinguished from the Hendricks Motorsports GTP Corvette body by the large front intakes mounted below the windscreen.

By 1987 the GTP ZX Turbo had been developed into one of the faster cars on the IMSA GTP circuit scoring 5 pole positions and one win with Geoff Brabham and Elliot Forbes-Robinson sharing the victory spoils at Miami.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

For 1988 Electramotive commissioned Trevor Harris to design the chassis for today’s featured car, #88-01 built by Jim Chapman’s JC Prototypes, using the same Electromotive alloy block motor and running gear as the ’87 GTP ZX-Turbo and similar Yoshi Suzuka designed bodywork.

After gifting the two endurance events at Daytona and Sebring to the new Castrol sponsored Jaguar team, by not entering them. Geoff Brabham won nine of the remaining events, with a season high streak of 8 consecutive wins to secure the 1988 drivers and team championships for the Electramotive team.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

Chassis #88-01 was known as the King of the IMSA circuit and given the nickname Elvis, much of the success of the car was due to an electronically controlled turbocharger waste gate devised by John Knepp.

Four of Geoff’s wins were with John Moreton acting as co driver, they also scored a fifth non championship win together at Tampa in November 1988 and one more with Tom Gloy sharing the driving duties at Mid Ohio.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

Surprisingly in 1989 Geoff Brabham drove #88-01 to a further seven victories to secure a second drivers title and team title for the Electramotive team, this included securing pole with Arie Luyendyk, Chip Robinson and Michael Roe for the Daytona 24 Hours where they failed to finish and winning the 1989 Sebring 12 Hours with Chip and Arie sharing the driving.

During the 1989 season Geoff and Chip shared #88-01 with team founder Don Devendorf to win at Miami and Atlanta and shared another two victories as a driving pair.

Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo, Goodwood Festival of Speed,

In 1990 Don sold Electramotive to Nissan and the team became Nissan Performance Technology Inc, NPTI. Elvis was wheeled out for it’s third and final season of competition and scored three more wins, including a second win at Sebring where Derek Daly and Bob Earl shared the driving. Derek and Geoff shared the driving to secure the chassis final two wins at West Palm Beach and Road Atlanta.

In all from 1988 Elvis made 32 starts, 16 from pole, finished 26 of those races and won 20 of them. Geoff went on to secure the 1990 IMSA GTP championship using a new twin turbo V6 NTP 90 chassis and the 1991 championship with a combination of a twin turbo V8 Nissan R90CK, twin turbo V6 NTP 90 and NTP 91 chassis.

Thanks for joining me on this IMSA King Elvis edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for Ferrari Friday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Hot In Miami – Jaguar XJR5 #006

If one foreigner deserves a knighthood for trying to keep the British Motor industry alive while it was in self destruct mode twixt the early 1960’s and late 1980’s my nomination without question would go to Bob Tullis who prepared and raced a succession of British sports cars from Triumph and Jaguar to numerous victories over the 30 years in question.

Perhaps most remarkably of all having been a successful driver for 20 years, which included driving a few non British vehicles like the Dodge Dart, AMC Javelin,Bruce Jennings Porsche 911 and a one off drive in a works Oldsmobile Cutlass, Bob and Group 44 Inc business partner Brian Feurstenau managed to persuade Mike Dale of Jaguar Cars Inc, New Jersey, to fund an IMSA GT Prototype project which would see Jaguar return to Le Mans nearly 30 years after their last official appearance at the circuit in 1955.

Tullis who’s diverse endurance experience included driving the Triumph Spitfire Coupé and Howmett gas turbine car at Le Mans employed Lee Dykstra to design the new Jaguar XJR5 IMSA GTP challenger.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

The XJR5 was to be powered by a variant of the 2 valve per cylinder 5.34 litre / 326 cui Jaguar V12 which Bob had successfully campaigned in his Trans Am Quaker State Group 44 Inc Jaguar E-Type and later XJS models since the mid 1970’s.

In August 1982 Bob and long time co driver Canadian Bill Adam drove the XJR5 to a debut 3rd place finish behind two of the outgoing Porsche 935’s at Road America to score a debut class victory.

Bob and Bill scored the teams first overall victory at Road Atlanta in April 1983, two more followed at Lime Rock and Mosport, Doc Bundy then shared the final XJR5 victory in 1983 at Pocono with Bob.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Today’s featured chassis #006 first appeared at the 1984 Daytona 24 Hours where Bill Adam, Pat Bedard and Brian Redman qualified 6th and were classified a disappointing 24th, the sister car driven by Doc Bundy, David Hobbs and Bob Tullius qualified and finished 3rd.

Next time out at Miami with Brian and Doc at the wheel chassis #006 qualified 4th but more importantly crossed the line first when the chequered flag fell. Despite the team increasing the capacity of it’s V12 motors to a full 6 litres / 366 cui a couple of months later this would prove be their only overall victory in 1984.

After Porsche’s top driver Derek Bell had been suitably impressed with the XJR5 after testing it in 1983 Jaguar gave the green light to Bob and Group 44 to take the cars, one of which would be #006 driven by Tony Adamowicz, John Watson and Claude Ballot-Léna to Le Mans in 1984.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Tony, John and Claude qualified 19th and retired after an accident on lap 212 while the sister car driven by Brian, Doc and Bob qualified 14th and made it to lap 291 before the gearbox gave up.

Chassis #006 returned to the States and finished the season with a 2nd place finish in the Daytona 3 Hours with Brian and Hurley Haywood at the wheel.

For 1985, by which time Lee Dykstra reckoned he had redesigned 99% of the XJR5, #006 was prepared for the Le Mans 24 hours.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Jim Adams joined Brian and Hurley in chassis #006 where the car was qualified 17th and retired after only 151 laps with a constant velocity joint failure.

The sister car driven by Bob, Chip Robinson and Claude qualified 16th and finished 13th overall and first in the GTP class.

The cars final two races were back in the States where Chip Robinson joined Hurley to score a best 2nd place finish at Pocono in September 1985 on it’s final in period race appearance.

At Daytona in December 1985 the XJR5 model appeared for the last time, before it was replaced by the all new XJR7 in 1986, Brian and Hurley sent the model into retirement with a fine second place less than 8.5 seconds behind the winning Hobert Racing Porsche 962 driven by Al’s Holbert and Unser.

Today #006 is owned by Don Miles who can be seen driving the car at Silverstone Classic events in these photographs.

Thanks for joining me on this “Hot In Miami” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for Ferrari Friday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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