21 replies to this topic

[Roger Clark]

To me, one of life's little mystery's has always been why Jim Clark never drove the Ford GT. He had strong links with Ford through the Lotus Indianapolis programme and later through the DFV, but he never drove the company's flagship racing project.
I know that after the disqualification of the lotus 23 at Le Mans in 1962, Chapman swore that Team Lotus and its drivers would never return to Le Mans. But surely Ford wouldn't have to dig very deeply into it's bank account to change his mind.
It is also possible that by that stage in his career Clark was not interested in long distance racing (he finished 3rd at Le Mans in 1960). Or perhaps Ford didn't want its racing programme to be dominated by Chapman or Clark.
Does anybody know the reason?

[Joe Fan]

That is a fair question considering Jim Clark even drove a Holman and Moody prepared Ford in a NASCAR race at Rockingham in 1967 just a week after F1 season ending race in Mexico. I don't think Ford would not want Clark to drive for them as I believe Ford officials actually recommended Clark to Holman and Moody (which was basically a Ford factory team at that time) to give him a ride in their NASCAR program (with Jochen Rindt serving as a relief driver). It may have had to do more with Ford not wanting the preception that the GT40 was a Lotus than anything else when it came to not approaching Chapman. That is why they went to Eric Broadley and his Lola GT instead of Lotus according to my GT40 book. Judging by the remarks on my GT40 thread where many believe the GT40 was a rebadged Lola, you can see why Ford felt this way.

As far as the reason why Clark never drove a GT40, I think it probably had to do with Colin Chapman. Maybe he wouldn't allow his driver to run in Le Mans after his proclaimation. Certainly, if Holman and Moody would offer Clark a ride in one of their NASCAR stock cars then they would have put him in one of their prepared GT40's in Le Mans if he could or wanted to.




[This message has been edited by Joe Fan (edited 03-13-2000).]

[f li]

Racing would have been changed had he done so:

"On March 31 he competed in a Formula Two race but retired. On the following weekend he was due to compete in a Ford sports prototype in the BOAC 500 at Brands Hatch but a mix-up over confirmation of the drive meant that Clark honoured a commitment to drive a Formula Two race at Hockenheim instead, for Gold Leaf Team Lotus. He was apparently unhappy about the drive but stood by the commitment.

"In this meaningless race, on a damp track, in a car he didn't much like, he crashed on the fifth lap of the first heat. Hitting some fir trees at some 240kmh, he was killed instantly."

We are indebted to Peter Bramwell for the above material.

[Ray Bell]

Clark's death was in 1968, by which time the GT40 and its derivatives had been around for a few years...
He was unhappy with the Lotus 30 & 40, he never ran in the Can-Am - maybe he just didn't want to drive the big sports cars?

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[Roger Clark]

THe ford he was to have driven was the a DFV Ford of Britain project, not a GT40. By the time Can-Am started 1966, Lotus had virtually given up on the 30/40. Clark did drive in some of the earlier US sports car races which preceded Can-Am.

[Ray Bell]

In what? Did he get a ride in one of the Lotus 19s with Ford V8s?

where and when, just out of curiosity?

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[Don Capps]

Clark had the misfortune to drive both the Lotus 30 and the Lotus 40 ("the 30 with ten more mistakes...") in the 1964 and 1965 Fall Pro Seasons, plus a few UK events for bad measure...

The 30 was a disaster and the 40 was even worse. Lotus just somehow missed the mark with it. The 19 was amazing in that it seemed to defy reality and was still around years past its shelf life (Daytona 1965).

The 23 was great and it was a 1600cc (1,558cc to be exact) in the car at the 1962 Nurburgring 1000K race that Clark streaked off into the distance. This was a prototype of the Lotus Twin-Cam that was to show up in the Cortina.

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Yr fthfl & hmbl srvnt,

Don Capps

Semper Gumbi: If this was easy, we’d have the solution already…

[Ray Bell]

Are you sure about the size of the engine at the Nurburgring? I have to ask, my memory tells me 1100. But I have been wrong before, I'd just like to be sure.
We had a 19 here which dominated sports car racing with a 2.6 Climax - until it was damaged in May, 1965. The most promising car we then had was a Rennmax Maserati - a veritable copy of the 23, with a bigger engine bay (and that abortionate section of chassis done the right way) and a 2.7 litre Maserati 4-cyl engine fitted.
Frank Gardner drove it in the major event of the year, the Australian Tourist Trophy at Lakeside. On the second lap of the first heat, well out in front, it threw its engine internals out on the road, knocking out the gearchange and clutch hydraulics on the way. So it beat itself to death while Frank steered it off the road.
Later he said, "The crankshaft had just been sitting around crystallising for years..."
Matich's 19, meanwhile, had been severely upgraded prior to its demise, with Brabham rear suspension (which eliminated upright location from the job the driveshafts had to do), bigger brakes and a Hewland gearbox, and it held a lot of outright lap records. His next car got a lot more of them, it had a Traco Olds engine and was a lot like a rebodied McLaren.

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[Don Capps]

A correction: the Lotus 23 at the 1962 Nurburgring 1000K had a 1,500cc engine, not the 1.6-litre (1,558cc) version. It was a prototype based on the new Ford 116E block.

Somewhere I have info on the Lotus 30 & 40. If I recall, A.J. Foyt ordered a 40 or a 30. It crashed at Nassau or somewhere, just don't recall the details right now. I also recall Clark finishing 2nd at Riverside in a 30 or a 40 - was it 1965?

The reason for the brew-up at Le Mans over the 23's was that they used four studs on the front wheels and five studs on the rear wheels and Chapman and the Le Mans Gestapo got into right fine shouting match over it and Chapman stormed out and said "Never again!" This was during scrutineering so the 23 spared many cars from embarrassment. I am certain that it was strictly incidental that the 23 was threat to the French twiddlers for the Index....

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Yr fthfl & hmbl srvnt,

Don Capps

Semper Gumbi: If this was easy, we’d have the solution already…

[Ray Bell]

Six stud rear wheels, the regular pattern for Lotus wobblies...
the French said (as posted previously):
"M. Chapman, if it needed six studs before, it is now not strong enough with four, so you may go home..."

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[karlcars]

This is a great thread which reminds me of a few paragraphs from my new book on Gurney which read as follows:

"Happen it did, on 26 November 1967, and it produced a dilly of a race [the first Rex Mays 300]. It was the final USAC event in a season that had left the championship undecided between Mario Andretti and A J Foyt. Richter did an outstanding job of lining up a variegated field in the Riverside tradition for a race that was run in the usual clockwise direction, counter to USAC custom. Rounded up to join the usual USAC suspects were sports-car specialists George Follmer, John Surtees, Ronnie Bucknum and Chuck Parsons. And none other than Jimmy Clark was making one of his rare non-Lotus appearances to drive a Vollstedt-Ford.

"A different short course of 2.6 miles was used, one that usefully cut off a chunk of the long straight. Having tested at the track earlier in the week, Gurney skipped the first day of qualifying. Clark was fastest on Friday but when Dan arrived on Saturday he immediately captured an unbeatable pole in his Eagle powered by a Gurney-Weslake Ford. Clark was next to him in the front row, followed by John Surtees and Bobby Unser. Championship rivals Foyt and Andretti were in the third row for the rolling start.

"The 300-mile race named for the late Rex Mays was memorably chaotic. It was described by one reporter as “Mack Sennett-like”, referring to frenetic silent-film comedies, and by another as “wild and woolly.” Lloyd Ruby set the style by spinning half-way around the first lap with two-thirds of the charging field close behind him. Ruby not only recovered but went on to finish fourth. The second lap saw another spin and Bobby Unser hitting the wall at turn nine, but not severely enough to retire him.

"Meanwhile Gurney shot into the lead “with Clark not a foot off his backside,” said Del Owens in Autoweek. On the 23rd of 116 laps Clark passed Gurney on the inside in the treacherous turn six but Dan was soon challenging again. A lap later Clark’s engine, overrevved earlier, gave up the ghost and Jimmy waved Dan by."

How's that for an unusual Clark mount!


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Karl Ludvigsen

[Ray Bell]

Like the ERA - was that at Monaco or Rouen?

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[Dennis David]

I remember Donahue talking about leading Gurney at Riverside one year and knowing that Gurney "owned" that circuit figured he must be driving over his head and thought it wise to slow down!

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Regards,

Dennis David
Yahoo = dennis_a_david

Life is racing, the rest is waiting

Grand Prix History
www.ddavid.com/formula1/

[Roger Clark]

Karl, I believe this was only the second time Clark raced a non-Lotus single seater, the othe being a Gemini-Elva Formula Junior at Brands Hatch on boxing Day 1959, his firstever single seater race. do you know how he came to drive the Volstedt? I believe it was a spaceframe car and I remeber Chapman quoted as saying that Clark refused to drive non-moncoques for safety reasons. I think the race you describe was a week before or after his drive in NASCAR so perhaps he was having a short holiday!
You also mention Surtees in that race, presumably in a Lola. Was this his only USAC race?

[Fast One]

Yes, the Rex Mays 300 was Fearless John's only USAC race. He drove George Bignotti's Lola-Offy, which was oddly offset in the rear but not the front! He ran 4th behind Gurney, Clark and Unser, and ahead of Andrtti and McCluskey until the gearbox linkage failed. The race was also, according to Henry Manney, the finest drive of Dan Gurney's career.

[Ray Bell]

But Henry didn't see him trounce the field at Ballarat, where he took victory in a BRM (very rare in those days!) 2.5 over a fairly classy field. Graham Hill couldn't match him, but the best bit was that his car had been taken for a joyride overnight before the race!
Strangely, I see that string of consecutive Riverside 500 wins as a kind of triumph beyond any single race...

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

[Don Capps]

Clark drove the ERA at Rouen in 1964. I am sorry I missed it - I am told he was very impressive, beating the owner's time on his second lap and then getting the ERA going much, much faster than anyone realized it was capable of running.

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Yr fthfl & hmbl srvnt,

Don Capps

Semper Gumbi: If this was easy, we’d have the solution already…

[charles r]

This is a great thread which reminds me of a few paragraphs from my new book on Gurney which read as follows:

"Happen it did, on 26 November 1967, and it produced a dilly of a race [the first Rex Mays 300]. It was the final USAC event in a season that had left the championship undecided between Mario Andretti and A J Foyt. Richter did an outstanding job of lining up a variegated field in the Riverside tradition for a race that was run in the usual clockwise direction, counter to USAC custom. Rounded up to join the usual USAC suspects were sports-car specialists George Follmer, John Surtees, Ronnie Bucknum and Chuck Parsons. And none other than Jimmy Clark was making one of his rare non-Lotus appearances to drive a Vollstedt-Ford.

"A different short course of 2.6 miles was used, one that usefully cut off a chunk of the long straight. Having tested at the track earlier in the week, Gurney skipped the first day of qualifying. Clark was fastest on Friday but when Dan arrived on Saturday he immediately captured an unbeatable pole in his Eagle powered by a Gurney-Weslake Ford. Clark was next to him in the front row, followed by John Surtees and Bobby Unser. Championship rivals Foyt and Andretti were in the third row for the rolling start.

"The 300-mile race named for the late Rex Mays was memorably chaotic. It was described by one reporter as “Mack Sennett-like”, referring to frenetic silent-film comedies, and by another as “wild and woolly.” Lloyd Ruby set the style by spinning half-way around the first lap with two-thirds of the charging field close behind him. Ruby not only recovered but went on to finish fourth. The second lap saw another spin and Bobby Unser hitting the wall at turn nine, but not severely enough to retire him.

"Meanwhile Gurney shot into the lead “with Clark not a foot off his backside,” said Del Owens in Autoweek. On the 23rd of 116 laps Clark passed Gurney on the inside in the treacherous turn six but Dan was soon challenging again. A lap later Clark’s engine, overrevved earlier, gave up the ghost and Jimmy waved Dan by."

How's that for an unusual Clark mount!


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Karl Ludvigsen

Thank you Retriever, well worth a delve!

[Glengavel]

Holy thread bump!

 

I like the comment by Brock Yates(?) about how Clark drove the Vollstedt "faster than was thought capable by a mortal man".

 

Regarding that fateful April 7th; could Clark have made a silk purse out of the Ford P68?

[charles r]

P68 - The most beautiful sports prototype ever (P4 aside).

 

Frank Gardner couldn't get it to work, so an interesting question!

[Rupertlt1]

One GT Clark did drive was the Lotus Elite. To quote myself:

 

The high point in the story of the Hobbs Mecha-Matic gearbox came at the Nurburgring-Nordschleife in the Eifel Mountains on May 28, 1961, when David Hobbs, son of the inventor, and Bill Pinckney, two lads from the Midlands, defeated the might of Porsche in the 1600 c.c. sports racing car class in the Nurburgring 1000 kms with their automatic Lotus Elite. Bumped up to the 1600 c.c. class by the organisers for their non-standard gearbox, after protests from fellow competitors, they faced much more powerful opposition from Porsche. After this remarkable achievement the future of the gearbox looked set fair.

 

This era was one of flowering innovation with four-wheel-drive, gas turbines and twin-engined cars all being tried in one form or another. The giant-killing effort in Germany had caught the attention of Colin Chapman at Lotus. As David Hobbs fought to establish himself as a professional racing driver he had also come to the attention of Jaguar, and for 1962 he took over the privateer Peter Berry-entered 'E' type from Bruce McLaren for the season. He was entered in the Jaguar, 3 BXV, for the inaugural Daytona 3 hours with the Lotus sitting idle. As Hobbs tells it "Colin Chapman rang up and asked he could borrow the Mecha-Matic Elite for Jim Clark to race at the same event."  Thus it came to be that Clark drove the Mecha-Matic in Florida, streaking away in the class lead but retiring after sixty laps with a failed starter motor and being classified 29th. Jim Clark later had a road-going Elite, HSH 200, fitted with a Hobbs gearbox, as did Stirling Moss. Clark said in the book Jim Clark at the wheel: "Those who scorn automatics take note!"

 

RGDS RLT

 

 

[David Lawson]

Ray Bell's questions in posts 6 and 8 as to whether Jim Clark raced a Lotus 19 has so far gone unanswered. Clark did race a Climax powered 19 at Laguna Seca in 1963 and in the UK in 1964.

 

Regarding the original question, I would assume that as Lotus and Clark were very busy with the Indianapolis project for Ford from late 1962 through to 1967 and in saloon cars also for Ford with the Cortina and occasionally a Galaxie they just didn't have the capacity to get involved with endurance racing as well and Ford wisely looked to other teams for this.

 

David