Attention racers,
Event 24 is over, and here are the abridged results:
Full results and more on the event sheet.
PHLS#25 officially starts now, with a new event format: Triathlon.
At first glance, the Ford GT40 MkI, the Ferrari F-158 and the Shelby Daytona have very little in common. And that’s precisely the reason they were chosen, because in this season one finale, you get two competitions for the price of one.
First, you’ll be battling for the leaderboard as always, best time in the fastest car wins, you know how it goes.
But second, by driving and submitting a time for all three cars, you open a new leaderboard where what counts is your cumulated time on all three cars. Don’t worry about calculating it, just submit individual times with each cars, the magic robot will do the rest.
Double leaderboards means double opportunity for points. This event will also run for two weeks instead of the usual one. It’ll give me a little break, and you the opportunity to complete the triathlon. Since this is the season finale, we’ll get a season winner at the end of this, and then the global leaderboard will get a reset.
See full details and past results in the top post.
Would you like to know more?
The origins, from Grand Prix to F1 and the 24 heures
Today, Formula One is the most prestigious motorsport competition, closely followed by the 24 heures du Mans. But did you know these two very different competitions have a common ancestor?
The term Grand Prix comes from the 1906 Grand Prix de l’Automobile Club de France. It wasn’t strictly speaking the first such race, the Paris-Rouen Horseless Carriage Contest of 1894 is generally considered the first motorsport race, and for a few years, all major motorsport events were point-to-point races between cities, on public (dirt) roads.
In 1900, motorsports got into the Summer Olympics (with almost exclusively French competitors), but more importantly the first Gordon Bennett Cup event was held. The Cup was to be a race opposing the finest automakers and pilots of each nation, and it saw the first application of international racing colours.
The 1906 ACF Grand Prix replaced the Gordon Bennett Cup. It was held near Le Mans, though not on anything close to the current circuit, and was a 12 lap, roughly 12 hour race. It’s only in 1921, when the French Grand Prix returned to Le Mans, that the layout took the shape that is still largely used. The GP lasted 4 hours, but it already had the Hunaudières, the Mulsanne Corner, Indianapolis and Arnage, Maison Blanche and Tertre Rouge.
Two years later, in 1923, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest reused that same layout for a new race, but this time not a Grand Prix. It wasn’t strictly the first endurance race, but it was the first time drivers weren’t fighting against the clock, but rather against the odometer. And thus began the 24 heures du Mans.
The layout of the 24 heures evolved slightly over the years, but the formula remained the same. Grand Prix races however would evolve significantly. Every year, a varying number of Grandes Épreuves and minor Grand Prix were held, it was a bit of a mess, and in 1950 the FIA decided to reorganise all that into a coherent season of Grand Prix racing. The result was the World Championship of Drivers, with a set number of events, a point system, and it quickly became known by the name of its highest category: Formula One.
F1 64
When F1 started in 1950, the Scuderia Ferrari was already there. In fact, Ferrari hasn’t missed a single season in 75 years, making both its own chassis and its own engines. And with that longevity comes a few wins, 15 driver titles and 16 constructor titles total.
F1 evolved a lot over the years, and the 1964 Ferrari 158 is a pure product of the 1960s.
It’s rear-mid engine. This might seem obvious today, but it hasn’t always been. Enzo thought the horses should always come before the cart, but in 1960 it’s a mid-engine Cooper T51 that won, and Enzo had to relent. From 1961, Ferrari’s F1s would be mid-engined, like everybody else’s.
It has no aero. The first wings appeared in the 1968 season, and before that, a F1 was little more than a metal tub with 4 wheels. They were often difficult to control and of course lacked any safety equipment you can find on modern race cars. Until the 80s, there was usually one death a year during the F1 season.
It was Rosso Corsa. In 1964 F1 teams were still using the national racing colours established during the days of the Gordon Bennett Cup, and naturally Ferrari raced in red. The first sponsored liveries appeared in 1968, and it was a tobacco company that shot first. Indeed, in the 1960s, reports on the health risks of tobacco were coming out, and motorsport was a loophole allowing them to circumvent advertising bans that were starting to roll out.
It was driven by a Brit. John Surtees took his first, and only, championship in 1964 with the F-158. Before 1950, Grand Prix had been dominated by the French, the Germans, and the Italians. The Argentinian Juan Manuel Fangio and Italian Alberto Ascari marked the first decade of Formula One, taking 7 of the 10 titles, but starting in the late 50s and all through the 1960s, it was British and Australian drivers that dominated.
Ford, Shelby, and Le Mans
The AC Ace is a British roadster powered by a Bristol straight-six (in fact, a BMW engine design taken as a war trophy after WWII). In the early 60s, famed race driver Carroll Shelby was looking to make his own racecar, wanting something light and powerful, and looked to European manufacturers for inspiration. When Bristol ceased production of their engine, Shelby seized the opportunity and offered AC to provide them big ‘ol Ford V8s.
The AC/Shelby Cobra was born. AC would provide the chassis, Shelby would forward the engines from Ford. 998 chassis were built, 665 received the “small” 289 cu.in. V8, while 343 received the biggest engine option, the 7.0L Ford FE 427.
In 1963, AC took a Cobra with the “small” 289 engine to Le Mans, finished 4th in GTs behind three Ferrari 250 GTOs. Carroll Shelby, having his own beef with Enzo Ferrari, took to heart to develop a race version specially dedicated to beating the 250 GTO. In 1964, Shelby brought one Cobra Daytona Coupe to Le Mans, and finished 1st in GTs. Job done.
That win would attract the attention of Ford, looking for someone to take over the development of the GT40. The story of the GT40 is well known. Ford was an old brand for old people, and Henry Ford Jr accepted the idea that participating in motorsport would give Ford’s image a boost. Ford approached Ferrari, but Enzo and Henry butted heads, and Henry Ford Jr ended up spending a cool billion trying to humiliate Enzo Ferrari where it would hurt the most: Le Mans.
Ford chose the Lola Mk6 as the basis for its future GT, and as a result the GT40 MkI was developed in England with a bunch of British engineers. While Shelby beat Ferrari in 1964, Ford struggled and all three GT40s entered broke down. Ford approached Carroll Shelby, handing him the development of the GT40. After an unsuccessful attempt in 1965 (6 cars entered, 0 finishes), Shelby would complete the GT40 MkII, swapping the Windsor V8 for the 427 Ford FE, the same he put in the Cobra. This would be good enough to take all three podium spots in 1966.
The Cobra and GT40 thus have a linked history. Both are very rare, and thus very expensive collector’s items. However, there are a number of replicas and “continuation cars” that have been built over the decades, often less prestigious but sometimes with upgraded components and better performance than the originals.
Replicas are a niche, but profitable business. Profitable, and at times ruthless. The market for original Cobras was so tight that in the early 1990s, Shelby thought to capitalise on it, by ordering new chassis and trying to have them registered as original AC chassis. Ford, on the other hand, forgot to register the name GT40, and a replica builder took the name. This is why the 2000s revival had to be simply named Ford GT.