The 1967 Ford Mark IV: Legend of Le Mans

So far, the number one fort has established a lead of 32 miles. Ferrari's expected challenge has yet to unfold. Fifteen cars have already retired trying to keep up with the bright red war. It is one of the

legend

ary racing stories in 1963. Ford Motor Company agrees to buy Ferrari, the Italian automaker famous for its exotic sports cars and its exceptional racing team. At the 11th hour, founder Enzo Ferrari retires from the agreement, upset but undeterred, Ford chairman and CEO Henry Ford, the second grandson of the company's founder, Henry Ford makes a decision if his company cannot buy Ferrari, then he will beat Ferrari in the biggest sports car race big in the world, so they will challenge Ferrari on their favorite course, which at that time was everyone's 24 hour and this was a big bet basically on Ford's part because they really had no experience in long distance sports car racing, They were out of their element and this was a place for Ferrari to have reigned supreme for years.

The 24 Hours of LeMans in western France was never about speed. an endurance test the circuit itself is approximately 8.3 miles around there are some very tight corners there is an exceptionally long straight, the Mulsanne straight, where this car, the Mark 4, was doing about 212 miles per hour, but At the end of that straightaway there's a hairpin curve where you have to slow down to about 3,035 miles per hour to get there safely, so going through that kind of thing over and over again over the course of 24 hours you can imagine. How difficult it is for the mechanics of the car, not to mention the strain it puts on the two drivers, just finishing the race was a great achievement and a victory for Ford would not be easy.

The company approached British engineer Eric Broadly of Lola Cars and asked him for a car called the Lola gt2. beautiful car, the lowest car in existence at the time, just 42 inches off the ground. Ford decides that they will make a deal with it and use the Lola GT as the basis of their next car, although the Ford race car turns out to be even shorter as the car measures 2 inches wide with its roof only 40 inches high the press Racing nicknamed Ford's car the GT40. The car debuted in 1964. It promised that a GT40 led the first hour and a half, but 90 minutes makes no sense in a 24-hour race. they came in at 64 probably thinking they would put on a good show.

I don't know if they thought they would win the first time, but it wasn't such a good show, none of their cars managed to finish, so it must have been that way. a little disappointing Ford turned to Lamar Veteran Carroll Shelby John Wyer built the car and then took it to Lamar in 1964 and it didn't work very well and that's when they turned the program over to us in California. Shelby's team took the cars apart and cut them up. weight and improving air flow and in February 1965 the GT40 took its first victory in the Daytona 2,000 kilometer race.

Four months later, Shelby returned to Los Angeles with a powerful new weapon: the gt40

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2 replaced the original Ford v8 289 with the company's big NASCAR. He tried 427, but the French classic once again brought disappointment. Six Fords were entered. None finished. Luck changed in 1966, buoyed by early season victories. Ford brought eight Marc Twos to Los Angeles, backed by teams of spare engines and an army of 100 people for whom we had specialists. everything was available if needed, I mean wiper specials, light specialists, engine specialists, they will break the specials there for everything if it happened when it came time for the race at 4:00 pm.

Henry Ford II himself dropped the starting flag, the

mark

to establish a furious pace. Drivers Ken Miles and Dan Gurney averaged over 140 miles per hour on some laps, however, it was Ferrari that failed to finish as the end of the race approached within three marks two leading. Ten Mile Field and Denny's House were in first place with car number one followed by Bruce McLaren and Chris Amon in car number two Ronnie Buck Newman Dick Hudson took third position with car number five feeling a publicity bonanza The executives Kim Miles had already won Daytona and Sebring, he was leading by a lap and a half and Ford decided that the three cars would cross the finish line at the same time because they were racing one, two, three professionals, all the drivers did.

They did as they were told and crossed the finish line as close together as possible, but a technicality ruined Ford's scheme. The sea. I always thought they made up the rule that Bruce McLaren had started a little further back at Lamar's start, so they said they had raced. Fifty feet further than everyone else and if anything ever broke a man's heart it was the fact that Kim Miles would have been the first and only person to win all three races in the same year despite the tie being overturned in the final 1 -2-3. was a dramatic realization of Ford's goal, the campaign could have ended at that very moment, but within weeks Ford made it official that it would return to Lamar in

1967

and with a completely new car designed and built in the United States, we had barely taken the time to clean it. in the aftermath and in the gate parts and stuff like that when the word got out, hey, we'll do it again.

Ford said he had hopes for the experimental J car named for its compliance with Appendix J of the Flame rule book, apart from the big black 427. In terms of engine and drivetrain, it was barely different from the brand: it was a lighter car, but just two months after Lamar's triumph, Ford's GT program reached its lowest point when Ken Miles died testing the J car and Foreign engineers from California struggled to correct the problem. J made the chassis stronger and reworked the body, but handling remained poor. Phil Remington Shelby's top manufacturer flew to Dearborn and in a week of non-stop work, he and Ford staff Rhys Culp converted the J car into a longer, sleeker and safer car, the mark 4, worked a lot into the design and when they said the wind tunnel in his head, he imagined what the car should look like by seeing some of the lines and then they tested it in a real place. wind tunnel here in Dearborn and discovered that Remick's design had shaped about a hundred pounds of drag out of the vehicle, so you have this great combination of aerodynamic ability that pierces the air but also downforce that keeps the car on the clue.

To avoid another action like the one Ken Wiles had with his wife, his efforts paid off in the first race of the brand four when he won the 12 Hours of Sebring in April

1967

with Bruce McLaren and Mario Andretti at the wheel and now everyone expected eagerly to Lamar, but Ferrari arrived in France with a new car of its own, the 330 p4, it had a 244 cubic inch V12 capable of generating 450 horsepower, not far from the 500 horsepower of the brand four. The Mark 4 had an ominous debut at LeMond when the windshields broke during pre-race practice. He had brought spare parts, but not enough for each of the Mark fours entered.

An urgent phone call was made to the United States the next morning at Orly in Paris. A 707 arrived with six windshield crises avoided on race day. Dan Gurney and AJ Foyt drove the red number one. The speed of the car was not a problem for them, they kept the car in one piece throughout the race, that was a cause for concern, well the car was incredibly fast, I mean it was very very fast, no one could run close of us and the greatest. The thing was to keep it around 24 hours, the Mark 4 was a great car and if it had an Achilles heel it would be in the brakes, the car was quite heavy, probably 500 pounds more than most of the cars in that same race and it would go fast . at 12 or so a little bit more and it probably weighed pretty close to 3000 pounds so the brakes had a lot of work to do after a three mile straightaway where you're really cooking gurney and foyt took the lead after 90 minutes and never Looking back, they maintained a disciplined pace, the strategy leading to a surreal moment at 2:30 in the morning, when one of Ferrari's best drivers remained behind the stretcher.

Michael Parks was the team's lead engineer for their sports car program and a very competent one. racer and engineer, sure enough here he comes Mike parks and he's on that light switch, you know, blink, blink, pick like this and you're like Arc is picking a fight hoping gurney will push the mark too hard or make a mistake that I was getting pretty tired of and he kept going for about four or five laps each time and he was on me and I wanted to say "hey, listen, you know, let's get to the point then, but I refused to do it, I just got it done." to the right after leaving Arnaud and there was a grass verge there.

I stopped and stopped on the grass and I could stop and stop right behind him. He was brave. He just stopped and stood still for about 10 seconds, which seemed like an eternity to both of us. The cars in the lead stopped in a dead stop. Gurney's strategy worked. The frustrated Parks retreated to the track and sped away. Stretcher running again on his own terms. He caught and passed the parks in five laps. That was really it. I think it was a distinctive illustration of how restrained Gurney was. able to convince Floyd that this was a way to win this race;

Let's not push this car so hard that we destroy it and put ourselves out of the race in the process. LeMond charged his usual price on the machinery. Three Ford cars were lost in a single accident at 3:30 a.m. m., but the red number one car never missed a beat as AJ Foyt crossed the finish line at 4 p.m. m. He was 32 miles ahead of second place in the checkered race he and Gurney had covered 3000 250 miles in 24 hours and set a new average race speed record of 135 point 4 8 miles per hour. Fightin Gurney walked up to the winner's podium as he stood there with a bottle of champagne in his hands, the stretcher was facing the crowd of press photographers, so we were there looking and there was a sea of ​​photographers below and they were all looking at us and there was a at which point no one was telling us what to do but I could tell they were there waiting for something trapped the moment Gurney shook his champagne and sprayed it all over everyone, it was like a fire hose.

He was taking people about 15 feet down and ruining everything. cameras and they loved it, it was the start of a new sporting tradition and the perfect way to celebrate an all-American victory. I had no idea I would create a tradition that still exists today. That was in 1967, so it was a very special moment. Ford Motor Company had made it clear that it could make racing cars as good as any in the world and that it could win the biggest race of all. There are hundreds of people participating in that victory. The engineers, like most of the Nolan team leaders, like Carroll Shelby, the people at all levels who are doing this, it was impossible to put together that program within a large company.

It's the only show I've ever known that didn't have a budget because Henry said we were going to do it, it was a good project. For the company at that time, the morale was very high, if you felt very proud to be a part of it, it was a big part of my entire racing career and as an American, not an American team, and the team was American to even though he's from Texas. Yeah, it was a big win, you know, for me he won Indy a couple of weeks before with Ford power and then half of Ford fire there for me, it was a big honor to get there on time on time.

I can say that it was my first and last. time and I don't plan to return, so I can say that the last time I was here I won the race and that's it.