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Team origins

John Wyer had been a familiar face on the international motorsport scene since the early 1950s. For 13 years he had been team manager for Aston Martin's competition department, and had spent five years as head of Ford Advanced Vehicles (FAV), progenitors of the Ford GT40. John Willment was a wealthy Ford dealer who had previously run cars – including the successful Willment Cobra – in a many motor racing categories with his own John Willment Automobiles team. After Ford withdrew from sports car racing following their 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans success, in January 1967 Wyer purchased the assets of the now-defunct FAV.^[1] From these, and with Willment's financial backing, they formed J.W. Automotive Engineering Ltd. as an endurance motor racing team, with Willment retaining John Willment Automobiles to run saloon cars.

Ford GT40 and the early Mirages

With the American works Fords being run and further developed by Shelby American, UK-based JWA continued with their own aerodynamic and mechanical improvement to the basic GT40 design. In contrast to Shelby's ground-up reconstruction of the GT40 – forming the 7 L (430 cu in) Mk4 – JWA chose to take a more subtle route. Chassis development was spearheaded by Len Bailey, a Ford Europe-employed engineer, and was more a refinement of the existing model than a complete redesign. The resulting Mirage GT car was effectively a GT40 monocoque, substantially lightened and fitted with more efficient bodywork, with engines of up to 5.7 litres (350 cubic inches) available, depending on the class regulations applicable.

The Mirage made its race debut in the 1967 1000km Monza in JWA's new Gulf Oil-sponsored Gulf Racing livery of pale blue, with orange detailing. The season started well for the JWA team: only a week after its debut the Mirage GT took victory in the 1000km Spa. This was augmented by victory in the Swerige GP, Stockholmsloppet, 1000km Paris and 9h Kyalami events, usually in the hands of Jacky Ickx or Jo Bonnier. However, in the 1967 24 Hours of Le Mans the two Mirage GTs entered retired before midnight, while Sheby's Mk4 cars swept to victory.

For the 1968 World Sportscar Championship season the FIA restructured the rules so that limited production, large-engined prototype cars such as the Mirage were no longer eligible. While Ford Europe with previous GT40 exponent Alan Mann Racing decided to pursue the new, 3 litre prototype category with the Ford P68, JWA preferred to retain their GT40 experience and develop a car for the, theoretically slower, 5 litre production sports category. So close to the GT40 were the Mirage chassis that, with only minor tweaks, they could be made to comply with the GT40's homologation specification, thereby meeting the 50-minimum production requirement for the 5 litre class. Built up with standard Mk2 GT40 bodywork, 4.9 litre engines and uprated brakes, the JWA cars again scored a string of victories early in the year, taking their first with a win for Ickx in the BOAC 500. This was followed by Paul Hawkins winning at Monza and a third place for Ickx and Hawkins in the 1000km Nürburgring. Ickx and Brian Redman repeated JWA's victory at Spa and the team finished 1st and 2nd at Watkins Glen, before Pedro Rodríguez and Lucien Bianchi crowned the season with victory in the 1968 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Despite an increasingly outdated car, especially with increased competition among the sports category promoted by the reduction in production requirement to only 25 cars, JWA started the 1969 World Sportscar Championship season strongly. As a portent of what was to come, Ickx and Jackie Oliver won the 12 Hours of Sebring race, but, with the switch to the Mirage M2 in mid-season, lack of reliability became a severe limitation and the results dried up. Ironically, it was the unavailability of its new Mirage car that prompted JWA to enter the aging JWA GT40s for the season closing 1969 24 Hours of Le Mans race. Defying the form book, and after a race-long battle with Hans Herrmann and Gérard Larrousse's Porsche 908, Ickx and Oliver won the race, driving the very same car (chassis #1075) that had won the previous year. To prove that JWA's victory was no fluke, although early accidents and retirements had reduced the severity of opposition, the sister car of David Hobbs and Mike Hailwood followed them home in third.

Gulf Porsche 917

With the lack of promise shown by the Mirage M2 when JWA were approached by Porsche to be one of three works-backed teams in 1970 (the others being Martini Racing and Porsche Salzberg) to run the Porsche 917 they jumped at the chance. The 917 had made its race debut in 1969, but in the intervening 12 months had developed a reputation for evil handling and boiling cockpit temperatures (making it somewhat unpopular with drivers!) and JWA had the additional responsibility of being Porsche's primary development partner. JWA engineer John Horsmann switched the 917's original rounded tail for an abruptly shortened, wedge-form tail, which improved rear downforce although lost a little top speed due to increased drag. In this, instantly recognisable, kurtzheck form the JWA Gulf Racing Porsche's showed instant improvement, taking both 1st and 2nd places in the season opening 24 Hours of Daytona race. Rodríguez added victory at Brands Hatch and Monza – and Jo Siffert and Brian Redman won the challenging Targa Florio in one of the team's Porsche 908s, with its sister car following home in second – before Siffert and Redman won the Spa race; the third time in a row that JWA had triumphed at the Belgian circuit. However, partly benefitting from the aerodynamic improvements made by JWA, it was the Salzberg team which gave the 917 its maiden victory at Le Mans. JWA bounced back from their double retirement at La Sarthe to take yet another 1-2 finish, at Watkins Glen, and victory at the season finale at Zeltweg.

The Gulf Mirages and Gulf Research Racing

References

• Race results and chassis information drawn from World Sports Racing Prototypes. Accessed: 28-08-2007

Sources

Autosport 12 November 1970

Design

In the early days of Grand Prix motor racing French manufacturers had dominated. Although officially a Matra, it was basically run by the non-works Matra team of Ken Tyrrell. The MS80 was one of the first F1 racing cars to be designed with "wings" for downforce to increase high-speed tyre grip. These were originally introduced into F1 in 1968. Due to some serious racing accidents with the flimsy 1969-type high wing constructions early in the racing season, like all 1969 F1 cars the MS80 was altered to use more sturdy lowered wings, directly attached to the car's body, later on.

Only two MS80's were assembled in 1969, a third monocoque was built but remained un-assembled until the EPAF company made it a complete car in 2006. Jackie Stewart in a 2006 issue of the British Motor Sport magazine referred to it as the nicest-handling F1 car he had ever driven.

The car was digitally reconstructed in detail and can be driven in the freely-available "69 Mod" for the Grand Prix Legends racing simulator, which appeared in 2005.

Competition history

The Matra MS84

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Matra MS80.

• Pictures of the MS80

Category:Formula One cars Category:Matra vehicles