The Ford Motor Company knows that a win at Le Mans will do them more good than it ever did Ferrari. Most people will never see a Ferrari, let alone buy one. For Ford, a win at Le Mans will satisfy millions of car buyers with the knowledge that their family sedan bears the same four-letter name as the Le Mans winner. Outright wins at Daytona and Sebring suited Ford very well, but their attitude toward the other qualifying events such as the Niirburgring 1000 kilometers and the Targa Florio suggests that they are not really interested in winning the "International Trophy for Prototype Sports Cars, Over 2-liters Capacity." All the Ford emphasis is centered around Le Mans, and that's just where they were' seven days after Sebring, with no fewer 'than eight cars running tests around Le Mans 8.3-mile course.
As if to spite Ford, Ferrari didn't send a single works car, making excuses that the drivers were ill. This psyched Ford, which had gone to the trouble of flying over a brand-new car-the much-rumored GT-P-to psych Ferrari. Obviously, in the so-called "J" car (nicknamed for the FIA's Appendix J, the rule book that dictated the GT-P's basic specifications), Ford Advanced Vehicles has produced quite an automobile. Bruce McLaren ran the car a Saturday and Sunday, helpfully suggesting modifications. He recorded his best time of 3: 55 around noon 5 on Sunday, then handed the car over to Chris Amon who, after only half a dozen laps, averaged 140.4 mph to set the -best time of the weekend 3.34.4. This was eight-tenths-of-asecond faster than John Surtees' best time in a Ferrari during last year's April tests, but slower than Phil Hill's 3: 30.0 in a 7 -liter Ford GT 40 on the eve of the 1965 race.
The times recorded during the two test days suggest that Ford hasn't looked for more speed since last year; they concentrated instead on making the cars more reliable. There's no doubt that the 7-liter Mk. IIs are thoroughly debugged more so than the highly stressed 4.7-liter GT 40s, which have had their share of troubles. Ford's confidence in the Mk. II is under lined by the fact that the GT-P will not run at Le Mans-even though it is a more advanced design and did very well for its first time on a race track. Despite an identical wheelbase, it is smaller than the Mk. II in overall size, and is some 300 lbs. lighter. The weight reduction has been achieved largely by using honeycombed aluminum in the chassis construction. Its suspension geometry differs from the Mk. II in detail only, and the two-speed automatic transmission is another one of Ford's seemingly unlimited number of experimental units.
Ken Miles achieved the second fastest time of 3: 36 in a Shelby American 7-liter Mk. II coupe with a four-speed manual transmission. A Holman-Moody sister car was completely destroyed when Walt Hansgen crashed at the end of the pit straight on Saturday morning. The road was still wet at this stage, and Hansgen's car aquaplaned and fishtailed at the approach to a fast right-hander. Hansgen steered for the escape road but hit a bank of sand, which flipped the big Ford at something approaching 120 mph. It took some time to cut the critically injured driver free, and despite all efforts, he died in the hospital five days later without ever regaining consciousness. The organizers plan to use arresting nets in the escape roads on race day.
The Alan Mann-entered 4.7-liter Ford GT 40s driven by Jackie Stewart and Sir John Whitmore were timed at 3: 38 and 3: 40.3 respectively, which was almost as fast as the 7-liter cars. But Ferraris were there. A disquieting note for Ford was the time posted by the independent Ecurie Francorchamps 365/P2 Ferrari piloted by "Beurlys". This car, which ran fifth at Daytona until it blew up, was fifth fastest at Le Mans with a 3: 41.6. The bodywork has been brought up to P3 specifications, but the engine is a 4.4-liter version of the traditional Ferrari V -12, with a single over head camshaft on each bank of 'cylinders. There's little question that the P3 Ferraris with their four-cam four-liter engines will be faster. Slower than the Belgian-entered 365/P2 were GT 40s driven by Guy Ligier (Ford France), Skip Scott (Essex Wire) and Herbert Miiller (Ecurie Filipinetti). The three private GT 40s qualify as production sports cars, and will run against a pair of Ferrari 275/LMs.
The new Matra-BRM was astonishingly fast. This Anglo-France effort is a small coupe featuring a tubular chassis derived from Matra's highly successful Formula 2 cars, and a 2-liter V -8 engine derived from BRM's 1965 Formula One powerplant. Although it has yet to tangle with the Ferrari Dino, it was over six seconds per lap faster than Porsche's fastest 2-liter prototype with fuel injection' and slightly modified bodywork. Porsche will run their normal, Weber-carbureted Carrera 6s as production sports cars. The once-mighty GT class has ebbed away to virtually nothing. No Cobras are entered, nor Corvettes, nor Ferrari GTs, nor even any of the raucous little buzz-bombs that have terrorized the small displacement classes in the past. In fact, the only GT car is a hopelessly-outclassed (if there was a class) Porsche 911, entered under a pseudonym.
Top speeds along the 3.5-mile Mulsanne straight were not timed during practice, so we are forced to rely on drivers' hasty glances at their tachometers, and convert rpm into mph. The 7-liter "J" car reached 215 mph, and Skip Scott claimed his 4.7-liter GT 40 achieved 211 mph, so there might be 20 cars consistently soaring to over 200 mph when the battle is joined in June.
Maybe speed is the big attraction at Le Mans. Maybe it's the fearful number of lives this 24-hour race has taken over the years-the lives of drivers and spectators alike. It's a bloody dangerous race, even more so than the occasionally macabre Indianapolis 500-mile. Jim Clark, for one, refuses to run at Le Mans, saying, "I honestly don't believe there are 110 drivers in the world who are competent enough to drive on that circuit in cars of widely differing performance, in rain and darkness.
Indeed, there seems to be no reason for half a million spectators annually choosing to be bored for all or part of the 24 hours, nor any reason why every news medium in the world should be so concerned with the unfolding of this drama. When you think about it, there's less merit in cars hitting 215 mph on the Mulsanne straight than dragsters reaching similar speeds at the end of a quarter-mile. So why all the fuss?
But there is a fuss about Le Mans, a fuss big enough to drive the world's second-largest automobile manufacturer into spending untold sums of money and corporate energy trying to win it. Twice Ford has suffered defeat at the hands of Ferrari. It took Ford three years to win the biggest apple, Indianapolis and they can't wait any longer for a triumph at Le Mans.
There are seven 7-liter Ford Mk. lIs entered, four for Shelby American (one of which may be the Sebring-winning lightweight roadster rebuilt as a coupe), and three for stock-car racers Holman-Moody. Ford wanted the Alan Mann team to run another trio of 7 -liter Mk. lIs, but the organizers, pointing out the 289 cu. in. displacement on Mann's original entry, ruled out switching to larger engines. The French Ministry of the Interior wants to ban all 7 liter cars (when it's France's slow dinky-cars that should be ruled off the track).
Against this onslaught, the official Ferrari entry of one 4-liter P3 and: one 2-liter Dino looks pitiful. But there will be several works supported P3s no less well-prepared than their lonely SEFAC-Ferrari counterpart. The dark horse is, of course, the single Chaparral, with no privately-entered, factory-sponsored back-up cars. Jim Hall has placed all his fragile eggs in one basket and is hoping that he can regain the legendary reliability that his cars had last year.
Ford has increased their odds mathematically, at least-by taking refuge in the safety of numbers and on that basis, should win. Ferrari, continuing to whimper about the Ford "steamroller," is really playing it safe by another score. If he loses, he can plead, "I had just one car at Le Mans." If he wins, he can boast, "I had just one car at Le Mans." And, as last year proved, not one factory Ferrari needs to finish the race for Ferrari to win. In several senses other than an overall victory, Ferrari can't lose.
