It was fast, at least on one lap, and it was really beautiful: the Ford P68 of the Alan Mann Racing Team was perhaps more suited to the beauty contest than the endurance race, but it's worth reporting on that too.
Ed Heuvink has taken on the task of describing the history of the little-known Ford sports car with Cosworth DFV engine from 1968/1969, prompted by Claude Nahum, who owns one of the surviving cars and uses it in historic racing today.
A look back
To understand the origins of the P68, you have to look back a little, which Heuvink does in the first 60 or so pages.
He explains how racing for the Ford brand came about and how it led to success with the Ford GT40. He describes the history of the three-liter Ford Cosworth Formula 1 engine and does not forget to take a look at touring car racing.
Development of the P68
The design of the Ford P68 was based on existing experience, but not on an existing vehicle. Everything was new. Aesthetically, Len Bailey's design was completely convincing, but the fact that it did not quite live up to expectations aerodynamically was only discovered later.
However, the aluminum-clad car failed not because of its aerodynamics, but because of its unreliability.
Never arrived
As Heuvink explained, the sports car never reached its goal. Despite best times in training and extremely positive feedback from the racing drivers, the P68 ended up being one of the most successful prototypes of all time. It was only later, in historic use, that the car was able to prove what it was capable of. In the meantime, however, the Cosworth engines were also more powerful and their reliability had also increased.
Every race
The author of this elegantly presented book devotes around 30 of the approximately 160 pages to the 1968 racing season and a further 18 to the second, incomplete 1969 season. It is not a glorious story, but it shows that there was potential.
Visual material worth seeing
Heuvink's readable text is perfectly complemented by many color and black-and-white pictures from various sources, but above all from McKlein.
These pictures alone almost make up for the EUR 79.90, because they are wonderful shots of the races and the atmosphere on the racecourse.
A well-rounded work
Once you have finished the 160 pages, there is hardly anything missing that you always wanted to know about the Ford P68 and the Alan Mann Racing Team behind it. The book, written in English, is not only intended for P68 fans, but also for all fans of sports car endurance racing in the late sixties.
It also shows how simple means were used to create attractive racing cars at the time and what problems designers and team bosses had to contend with. However, just like the car, the book is also limited, as only 999 copies were printed.
Bibliographical details
- Title: Alan Man Racing F3L / P68 - The story of Ford's three liter sports cars from the Sixties
- Author: Ed Heuvink
- Language: English
- Publisher: McKlein Publishing
- Edition: 1st edition, July 2017, limited to 999 copies
- Format: 29 x 29 cm, hardcover in slipcase
- Scope: 158 pages, 96 color and 123 black and white illustrations
- ISBN: 978-3927458970
- Price: EUR 79.90
- Buy/order: Online at amazon.de, online at McKlein Verlag or in the relevant bookstores
