One of the real pleasures of having designed some memorable racing cars for Carroll Shelby is that many fans of that great era, even today, continue to ask, “What if?”
What might have happened if Shelby had continued with the Cobra program in ’65? What if Ford hadn’t cancelled John Wyer’s struggling GT40 race program in the U.K. and contracted Shelby American instead to prep and race its GT40s at the end of ’64?
After Shelby’s Daytona Cobra Coupes had set the GT lap record on every track where they raced against Ferrari, Aston Martin, Jaguar and even Ford’s GT40s in ’64, the entire Cobra program was bought by Ford and then scrapped in favor of having the hard-driving Texan’s team develop and race Ford’s problematic yet slick-looking mid-engine GT40s as Prototypes in ’65.
Shelby’s Cobra roadsters and his “old” six Daytona Coupes were handed off to the U.K.’s very capable Alan Mann Racing team for the 1965 season to run as “privateers.” Mann’s team easily won the World Manufacturers’ GT Championship. Shelby, as the official manufacturer, went into the FIA record books.
Shelby, of course, went on to ever-enduring fame in ’66 and ’67 by winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans for Ford using Ford’s Kar Kraft-designed and -built Mk II Fords in ’66 and then the Mk IVs in ’67. The FIA’s reaction to Ford’s dominance was to limit engine displacement to 3.0 liters in ’68, a size that all the European manufacturers were then producing. It didn’t matter to Ford; Henry II had made his point and quit FIA racing.
As “insurance” in case Shelby didn’t get the coveted Ford GT40 contract for ’65, I designed another GT coupe for Shel’ called the Type 65. It was built on one of our new Mk II 427 Cobra roadster chassis. When Shelby got the Ford GT40 contract, the partially completed Type 65 wasn’t to my liking and never raced. But knowledgeable Shelby fans, even today, 60 years later, keep asking: “What if?”
[The secret Shelby coupes that never raced, part 1]
More than a year ago, I was approached by a couple of cool car guys with their amazing plan to recreate the Type 65, as I had wanted–and then take it to Europe! Maybe even to run it in the LeMans Classic for vintage racers.
To prove their intent, they showed me two original but still brand-new, unbuilt Mk II chassis from AC Cars on which we could build their new “vintage racer.” Wow.
Upon further discussion, I offered, “What if we built the car I had in mind for ’68 and ’69 when 3-liter engines were required?”
I explained that that was exactly what John Wyer had done in ’67 and ’68 with some redesigned GT40s called Mirage Mk Is. Wyer, with Gulf Oil sponsorship, used some very special 302 Ford V8s, but still had to run his trick Mirages as Prototypes because the FIA’s homologation requirement for 25 cars was never realized.
But these guys had two real production 427 Cobra Mk II chassis! These were built in FIA-legal quantity, so, if we put a new body on one of these, it’d theoretically be GT class-legal for vintage racing–and maybe, just maybe, the very particular French officials might just let us run ’em at Le Mans. Just imagine, 200-plus mph down the Mulsanne!
So that’s what we’ve done. I’ve designed a new body, presently as a quarter-scale clay model. We call it our Type 69. It features some significantly new (for an “old” front-engine design) aerodynamic concepts that I’d had in mind for the amazing Texan in case he ever decided to return to Europe and FIA competition.
I’m sure some sharp-eyed readers will see just how much the form of this new coupe has improved over my original Daytona. Stay tuned: The Type 69’s body lines are in process and should soon start to take shape in full size.
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