HERITAGE RACING
MILLE MIGLIA / NURBURGRING OLD TIMER GP / GOODWOOD REVIVAL
HERITAGE RACING
INTRODUCTION JAGUAR RETURNS TO THE RACETRACK in 2012 with the launch of Jaguar Heritage Racing, a programme which will see the marque enter the competitive arena through the vibrant world of historic motorsport. FOR THE FIRST TIME since their 1950s heyday, works-supported C-type and D-type racers will compete at venues including Goodwood and the Nürburgring. The season-long programme will also see Jaguar Heritage Racing support numerous additional events on the historic motoring calendar. These include the Mille Miglia, the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, and each round of the E-type challenge in the UK – a series which in 2011 demonstrated the depth of global interest in historic motorsport, and in Jaguar’s participation specifically.
The C-type takes victory at Le Mans on its debut in 1951
LET’S
RACE!
IN AUGUST, the Jaguar Heritage Racing team will then be in competitive action in Germany at the AVD NÜRBURGRING OLD TIMER GRAND PRIX. Often referred to as the ‘green hell’, the Nürburgring Nordschleife is regarded as one of the toughest tracks in the world, which is why today Jaguar has a dedicated test facility located there running a rigorous durability and performance programme for its modern range. From Germany, the team will then head back to British shores for the GOODWOOD REVIVAL IN SEPTEMBER. The undisputed jewel in the crown of the historic motor racing calendar, the Revival provides a dazzling backdrop of nostalgia for an equally dazzling array of competitive action in which the Jaguar Heritage Racing C-type and D-type will play their part.
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THE FIRST EVENT at which Jaguar Heritage Racing will be present is May’s 2012 MILLE MIGLIA retrospective. Now the world’s most prestigious regularity rally, the Mille Miglia was once a 1000-mile flat-out race across Italy contested by the most famous drivers and manufacturers of their time. This year’s Mille Miglia has particular significance for Jaguar as it marks 60 years since Sir Stirling Moss and chief test driver Norman Dewis took the start in the first disc brake-equipped C-type. Later that same year Moss recorded the first ever win for a disc-braked car when he drove another C-type to victory at Reims in France, paving the way for the wide-scale use of the technology that has saved countless lives since.
GROUNDBREAKING
INNOVATIONS
Perhaps the single biggest contribution that Jaguar has made to automotive safety was the work it completed with Dunlop to make the disc brake viable for wide-scale automotive use. Previously used predominantly in the aviation industry, the disc brake was introduced on the C-type race car in 1952 and brought great success at the Le Mans 24 Hours where the car stormed to victory in 1953. In the words of winner Duncan Hamilton, the brakes were the difference between the Jaguar and their more powerful competitors: “The disc brakes gave us a great advantage over our principal adversaries and we knew they’d last the 24 hours without having to be nursed. At the end of the Mulsanne straight, we Jaguar drivers could bring the cars’ speed down from 150mph to 30mph in less than 300 yards.” It wasn’t just disc brakes that made their debut on racing Jaguars. Throughout that decade a series of innovative solutions to faster, stronger car design came as a result of the motorsport programme. The D-type won three Le Mans 24 Hours thanks to its incredibly beautiful aerodynamic shape and aluminium monocoque construction – all skills that Jaguar’s Malcolm Sayer had learnt as a result of his apprenticeship designing aircraft. Today, Jaguar’s current XK and XJ models also use industry-leading and aerospace-inspired lightweight aluminium construction, while intelligent use of technology is evident throughout the range, which now includes the new XF Sportbrake. The spirit of innovation is also as strong as ever. In recent years, Jaguar has captured the public’s imagination with two spectacular design and technology concept vehicles, the C-X75 supercar and the C-X16 production concept sports car.
Left: The iconic straight-six XK engine that powered Jaguar to five Le Mans wins. Right: Jaguar’s stunning concepts - the C-X75 and C-X16
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hroughout its history Jaguar’s most iconic models have acted as test-beds for groundbreaking technologies and automotive innovations that have changed motoring forever. Features that seem commonplace in the 21st century – disc brakes, monocoque construction, lightweight aluminium bodywork, even aerodynamics – were either introduced or taken to the next level on cars like the C-type and D-type racers that competed in the 1950s.
JAGUAR
CHASSIS: Tubular frame, alloy bodywork ENGINE: 3442cc six-cylinder, 210bhp TRANSMISSION: 4-speed manual, rear-wheel drive SPEED: 150mph+
Peter Whitehead heads for fourth at Le Mans in 1953. His team mates would finish first and second
So, in 1950 a secret project was initiated to transplant the XK 120’s mechanicals into the heart of a racing car. A lightweight, multitube chassis was designed by engineer Bob Knight, with a front subframe carrying the engine. Larger exhaust valves, high-lift cams and carburettors boosted the 3.4-litre straight-six’s power to 200bhp. Undoubtedly one of the most beautiful racing cars ever made, the XK 120 C – hence C-type – was shaped by Malcolm Sayer, who used aerodynamic principles to make its form not just sensational but slippery. Thanks to its construction techniques, it also weighed nearly 25 per cent less than the road-going XK on which it was based. The C-type won on its debut at Le Mans in 1951, and scored a second win in 1953.
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n the late 1940s Jaguar’s production sports car, the XK 120, was already demonstrating it had the performance to win on racetracks and rally stages across the globe. Jaguar’s founder Sir William Lyons was quick to realise that a pure-bred Jaguar racing car could generate even greater publicity for the marque.
JAGUAR
CHASSIS: Monocoque, tubular subframes ENGINE: 3781cc six-cylinder, 285bhp TRANSMISSION: 4-speed manual, rear-wheel drive SPEED: 170mph+
The D-type’s 1954 Le Mans debut was hampered by fuel problems. It would make up for it with a hat-trick of wins
Malcolm Sayer’s design to clothe the radical new chassis was based on the principle that form follows function and it underwent many hours of wind-tunnel testing. Nevertheless, the elements that made it so slippery – the oval air intake, swooping bonnet, half-faired rear wheels and driver fairing – combined to create one of the most beautiful competition cars ever built. So wind-cheating was it that with the straight six-cylinder engine uprated to 250 and eventually 285bhp (in 3.8-litre guise), the D-type’s top speed rose to over 170mph despite the fact that the design actually produced active downforce at high speeds. Testing at Le Mans in spring 1954 resulted in the D-type smashing the previous year’s lap record by five seconds. D-types won at Le Mans in 1955, 1956 and 1957.
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s the C-type had pioneered the use of disc brakes in competition, the D-type saw the first serious use of monocoque construction. Even today, racing cars are built along the same lines: a strong ‘tub’ in which the driver sits, with the major mechanical components carried on front and rear subframes.
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
RACING
HEROES
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
S. MOSS
D. HAMILTON
LOFTY ENGLAND TEAM MANAGER
STIRLING MOSS RACER
DUNCAN HAMILTON RACER
Jaguar’s race team manager was no slouch behind the wheel – he finished second on the inaugural RAC Rally – but it was as the brains behind the works Jaguars that the 6’5’’ ‘Lofty’ would shine. His instinctive understanding of strategy helped Jaguar to its first Le Mans win in 1951 and countless other victories that decade.
Arguably still Britain’s most famous racer, Moss cut his racing teeth behind the wheel of Jaguars. It was Moss who shattered the Le Mans lap record in a C-type in 1951 and who raced the C-type at the 1952 Mille Miglia that introduced disc brakes to the competitive automotive world.
Larger-than-life Duncan Hamilton’s 1953 Le Mans win led to an apocryphal story... Excluded after practice on a technicality, Hamilton and partner Tony Rolt headed off to drown their sorrows, only to be suddenly reinstated. Allegedly Hamilton was quickly sobered up (with a brandy!) and headed off to win. Lofty England later refuted Hamilton’s story: “I would never have let them race drunk... I had enough trouble when they were sober!”
F. ENGLAND
THE JAGUAR RACING HEROES COLLECTION
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
N. DEWIS
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
M. SAYER
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
B. HEYNES
JAGUAR
RACING
HEROES
W. LYONS
NORMAN DEWIS TEST DRIVER
MALCOLM SAYER AERODYNAMICS
BILL HEYNES CHIEF ENGINEER
WILLIAM LYONS FOUNDER
Jaguar’s chief test driver played as large a role in the development of the C- and D-type as any fulltime racing driver. Poached to work for Jaguar by chief engineer Bill Heynes, Dewis started in the fledgling test department and eventually oversaw the ride and handling of 26 different models!
Jaguar’s brilliant aerodynamicist would argue that the function of a race car dictated its form and he could show you the mathematical workings to back up his theory. What wasn’t in dispute was that in designing the C- and D-type that way Sayer created two of the most beautiful machines ever to take to the track.
Standing next to a D-type as it bursts into life is to bear witness to one of the great powerplants. That distinctive straight-six XK engine was created under the studious eye of Jaguar’s chief engineer William ‘Bill’ Heynes. The XK engine was actually devised when Heynes spent long nights on firewatch at Jaguar’s factory during the Second World War.
Jaguar’s legendary founder William Lyons knew the value of motorsport from the moment his cars began to take top spot at events in the hands of privateers. Winning at Le Mans, he figured, would ‘put them on the map’ at a price that would reap dividends across the globe in terms of publicity.
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JAGUAR
JD
CLASSICS THE JAGUAR HERITAGE RACING programme is operated and managed by JD Classics, based in Maldon, Essex. An established player in the historic motorsport world, JD Classics will have responsibility for all race-day activities. DEREK HOOD, managing director of JD Classics, said: “Jaguars have been at the heart of our business for many years, and the opportunity to work with Jaguar Heritage Racing and ensure that the company is as well represented in historic motorsport today as it was when those same models competed in period is one we were only too happy to accept.” The Jaguar Heritage Racing programme will supplement the activities of Jaguar Heritage – a charitable trust and custodians of an extensive collection of priceless models from Jaguar’s past. Its cars are not campaigned competitively on-track, but will continue to be exhibited – and demonstrated – at a huge number of events during 2012. All archive images within this book are copyright ©Jaguar Heritage.
HERITAGE RACING
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