Sports car racing is a form of motorsport road racing which utilises sports cars that have two seats and enclosed wheels. They may be purpose-built prototypes or grand tourers based on road-going models. Sports car racing is one of the main types of circuit auto racing, alongside open-wheel racing, touring car racing and stock car racing. Sports car races are often, though not always, endurance races that are run over particularly long distances or large amounts of time, resulting in a larger emphasis on the reliability and efficiency of the car and its drivers as opposed to outright car performance or driver skills. The FIA World Endurance Championship is an example of one of the best known sports car racing series.
Nimrod Racing Automobiles was a partnership founded in 1981 between racing driver and car dealer Robin Hamilton and chairman of Aston Martin Lagonda, Victor Gauntlett. The project was intended to build sports prototypes for the World Endurance Championship and IMSA GT Championship using Aston Martin V8 engines. Although Aston Martin did not own the project, they offered their support for the chance to see success for their name in motorsports without the heavy cost of running their own team.
The International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) is a North American sports car racing sanctioning body based in Daytona Beach, Florida under the jurisdiction of the ACCUS arm of the FIA. It was started by John Bishop, a former executive director of SCCA, and his wife Peggy in 1969 with help from Bill France Sr. of NASCAR. Beginning in 2014, IMSA is the sanctioning body of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, the premier series resulting from the merger of Grand-Am Road Racing and the American Le Mans Series. IMSA is owned by NASCAR, as a division of the company.
The Porsche 962 is a sports prototype racing car designed and built by Porsche. Created to replace the Porsche 956, 962 was introduced at the end of 1984 and replaced the 956 in the IMSA's GTP class in 1985 due to regulation changes obsoleting the 956. It was also introduced in the World Sportscar Championship's Group C category in 1984. Over its decade-long career, the car in its Group C form won the 24 Hours of Le Mans twice, with a derivative of the car, the Dauer 962 Le Mans, winning a further title in 1994. In total, the 962 scored nineteen total constructor's championships across various series. The 962's successor was the Porsche WSC-95, introduced for the 1996 24 Hours of Le Mans, but did not receive factory backing or support.
Group C was a category of sports car racing introduced by the FIA in 1982 and continuing until 1993, with Group A for touring cars and Group B for GTs.
The World Sportscar Championship was the world series run for sports car racing by the FIA from 1953 to 1992.
The 1984 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 52nd Grand Prix of Endurance, and took place on 16 – 17 June 1984. It was also the third round of the 1984 World Endurance Championship. There were two big stories going into the race weekend: the absence of the Porsche works team and their drivers, and the return of Jaguar. Bob Tullius had commissioned the new Jaguar XJR-5 to run in the IMSA series and entered two for Le Mans. Earlier in the year, FISA had announced abrupt changes to the fuel regulations to bring them more in line with IMSA. Porsche and Lancia objected strongly because of their strong investment in the existing rules. In the absence of dominant Porsche works team, the race was left wide open between Lancia and the number of strong Porsche customer teams.
Spice Engineering was a British racing team founded by driver Gordon Spice with Raymond Bellm in the early 1980s, later becoming a successful sports car constructor in 1986. They competed in the World Sportscar Championship in Europe as well as the IMSA GT Championship in North America, at times partnering with major manufacturers such as General Motors and Honda as well as race engine manufacturer Comptech.
IMSA GT was a sports car racing series organized by International Motor Sports Association. Races took place primarily in the United States and occasionally in Canada.
Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) is the name of a former classification designated to sports prototypes in sports car racing competing in the IMSA GT Championship, maintained by IMSA between 1981 and 1993. The early cars were based on the almost same identical ruleset as the FIA's Group C category, but eventually evolved into a separate category. It was the successor to the Grand Touring Experimental (GTX) class, which were based on FIA Group 5 and Group 6 cars.
The Chevrolet Corvette GTP was an American Grand Touring Prototype-class sports prototype racing car which successfully participated in the IMSA Camel GT from 1984 until 1989. The car was professionally fielded in competition as General Motors' Chevrolet Corvette C4 official factory team effort in the IMSA GTP class.
The Nissan R90C was a platform used for Group C racing cars built in 1990 by Nissan Motors for competition in World Sportscar Championship (WSC) based in Europe and the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship (JSPC). The cars based on the basic R90C platform would compete until 1993 before Nissan chose to withdraw from sports car racing, not returning until 1997. It won three JSPC championships and several significant endurance races during its career.
The Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo was a series of racing cars developed for Nissan Motors by Electramotive Engineering to compete in the IMSA GT Championship. Running from 1985 to 1990, they were known for being the first car to defeat the Porsche 962 which had dominated IMSA's premiere GTP category. This led to Nissan winning the constructor's championship and 12 Hours of Sebring in 1989 and 1990. During 1990, the GTP ZX-Turbo was replaced by the newer NPT-90.
The Nimrod NRA/C2 was the only Group C racing car ever built by Nimrod Racing Automobiles in partnership with Aston Martin. It ran initially in 1982 in the World Endurance Championship before also joining the IMSA GT Championship. The final NRA/C2 would be retired in 1984 after the planned NRA/C3 replacement had been cancelled, and the company went bankrupt.
The Mazda RX-792P is a sports prototype racing car built for the IMSA GT Championship's GTP category for Mazda. Its career was short lived, with only two cars running in 1992 before the project was abandoned.
The Lola T600 was a racing car introduced in 1981 by Lola Cars as a customer chassis. It was the first GT prototype race car to incorporate ground-effect tunnels for downforce. The revolutionary aerodynamic design of the T600 was widely imitated throughout the 1980s by International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) and Group C prototype cars. The Lola T600 ran initially in the U.S.-based IMSA GT series and later in European Group C races.
The Mazda GTP is an IMSA GTP race car that was built by Pierre Honegger in 1981. Based on a Mazda RX-7, the car initially competed in the GTX category as the Mazda RX-7 GTP, before it was rebuilt for the IMSA GTP category in 1983. Throughout its career, the car used a Mazda 13B Wankel rotary engine, similar to that used in the production RX-7s. Although the rotary-engined sports prototypes generally had a reputation of being very reliable, the Mazda GTP frequently failed to finish races, and was never able to better the eighth place achieved at the 1983 24 Hours of Daytona. In 1986, one car was purchased by Erie Scientific Racing, and rebuilt to become the Badger BB. This car was no more successful or reliable than its predecessor, and was last used in 1989, by which point it was owned by Jack Engelhardt. The other car, meanwhile, was rebuilt by Honegger into the Denali Speedcar, which was used with moderate success in 1986 and 1987.
Crawford Composites is an American manufacturer of carbon fiber and composite parts company based in Denver, North Carolina. Crawford designs and manufacture structural and non-structural composite components in industries such as aerospace, aviation, motor sports, health care, defense and structural construction.
The Argo JM19, and its derivatives/evolutions, the Argo JM19C, and the Argo JM19D, are a series of IMSA GTP Lights/Group C2 sports prototype, designed, developed, and built by British constructor Argo Racing Cars, for the IMSA GT Championship, introduced in 1985. Its use in sports car racing continued into the early 1990s. It won a total of 7 races, and scored a total of 21 podium finishes. It was powered by a number of different engines, including a Mazda 13B rotary engine, a Buick V6 turbo engine, a Ferrari V8 engine, and even a Ford-Cosworth DFL V8 Formula One-derived engine. It did, however, find most of its success when equipped with the Mazda-powered Wankel rotary engines.
The Argo JM16 is an IMSA GTP Lights sports prototype race car, designed, developed and built by Argo Racing Cars, in 1984. It competed in the IMSA GT Championship sports car racing series between 1984 and 1993. It, unfortunately, did not win any races, however, it did achieve 11 class victories, and one 3rd-place podium finish. It was powered by three different naturally aspirated engines; a Ford-Cosworth DFV Formula One engine, a Buick V6, and a Mazda 13B Wankel 2-rotor engine.
BFGoodrich Racing
