Heroes: Ex Servicemen & Unlikely Daytona Winners

An invitation from friends, an introduction from another, and a level of trust from good people in the racing trade led to the opportunity in 2022 for me to drive the oldest car in my road-car history (so far!) back in September.

Almost since the very start of their efforts I’ve taken an interest in the progress for Mission Motorsport, an excellent charitable effort to find a way forward in re-training and future employment for injured ex servicemen and women in the UK.

We’ve had some very inspiring times together via a trio of opportunities to commentate at the amazing Race of Remembrance (pictured below), a memorable evening at Williams Grand Prix, a chance encounter at the Nurburgring where I had the opportunity to welcome some of their newest trainees into the FIA WEC paddock, and multiple encounters at the Goodwood Festival of Speed where Mission Motorsport always have a significant presence.

And it was there, in the summer, that I had the opportunity to re-acquaint myself with their founder, ex-Royal Tank Regiment Major Jim Cameron, to catch up with how things are going with the charity and, as things turned out, to get a very welcome invitation to the Mission Motorsport Invitational, held just down the road from the Festival of Speed in September.

On the how things are going front, the answer is – impressively well, the Charity expanded its reach some time ago beyond just motorsport and no has impressive roots int the wider automotive industry with thousands of beneficiaries finding opportunities to learn, develop and, in very significant proportions, find permanent employment.

“In many cases it’s a matter of tying together a lot of loose ends,” Jim told the DSC Editor some time ago. “The industry want people with either established skillsets or with the aptitude to learn very quickly. Military training can be appropriate for both.

“Beyond that it’s a matter of ensuring that our beneficiaries are equipped to take those opportunities when we can find them. That means packaging the support for some amazing people to allow them to focus on their future when perhaps the immediate past, and their present, have knocked their confidence.

“The success rate is very, very substantial, and once we have introduced employers to what our people can do, repeating the process, of course, becomes significantly easier.

The model is proving to be a very successful one, and with plans to expand the effort even further, this time into the rapidly expanding renewables sector, here’s hoping it stays that way!

Back to the September event though – The Invitational is an opportunity for a ‘gathering of the clans, bringing together the Charity’s leaders, some of their major industry contacts and successful beneficiaries, and then also some potential new ‘recruits’, to give them an opportunity to get some hands-on experience of some of the machines, and the people that might form important parts of their future career in ‘Civvy Street”.

The Invitational operates around a track day, with some interesting and exotic machinery laid on to give those present some high-speed fun. Beyond that there are always a variety of interesting machines available to sample on the roads around the circuit too.

Whilst the DSC Ed’s Audi is fairly fast – it is certainly not a track-day toy, so it was time to open up the address book and find something more interesting to take along.

After a couple of near misses (as always I’d left it late!) Alex Brundle came up trumps with a recommendation to talk to his friends at Le Mans Coupes.

Oliver Hulme took the call and whilst an initial plan to attend with one of their gorgeous Superformance-built Ford GT40 or Daytona Cobras – both plans though fell foul of circumstance, we’ll revisit both cars in due course on DSC though!

Oliver though came up with a simply excellent, and extraordinarily generous plan.

With nether of the Superformance cars available, the family would instead loan me their FIA certified 1970 Lancia Fulvia Sport, the car converted as a replica of the factory-built car that finished an astonishing 11th overall in the 1969 Daytona 24 Hours, Claudio Maglioli and Raffaele Pinto taking a 2 litre class win too in a 63 car field, winning the class by 22 laps from Masten Gregory’s Porsche 910.

The car would not be able to be tracked at Goodwood – but was fully road legal and would provide quite the draw in the paddock, discussions over the massive level of modification required even then to turn a 105 bhp V4 to a c.160 bhp race unit.

The period-correct (but very ‘DSC’) orange livery would be another major draw. But for that to happen the car had to get to Goodwood.

So that saw the DSC Editor arrive at Le Mans Coupes’ base in beautiful rural Sussex and climbing aboard the stunning little machine.

Half a century and more have passed since the car rolled out of Zagato’s workshop (the cars were built by Zagato on rolling chassis built by Lancia), and since then there has been a lot of progress on just about every single front.

So as I parked the Audi, with its comfy heated seats and climate control and electric everything, together with it’s powerful turbo-diesel and four wheel drive, there was just a touch of trepidation as I climbed aboard somebody else’s prized and historic race car for the c.90 minute drive on busy morning roads and, into the bargain, it was raining!

I shouldn’t have worried – now nobody is claiming that the little Lancia is a viable daily driver, but it came surprisingly close!

The engine is an absolute sweetheart, plenty of torque, and with 160 bhp in a car that weighs about as much as a well loaded shopping trolley, keeping up with traffic was not an issue at all!

The gearbox was a short throw, close ratio timewarp too, though it needed to get into fourth before the transmission noise came down to a civilised level!

That though was no major problem because the whole thing was simply enormous fun, and was clearly enjoyed by others on the road too, with a whole host of wide smiles, thumbs-ups and a couple of enthusiastic questions at traffic signals. This is a car that would stand out on a packed grid of historic racers, on a drizzly morning in rush hour traffic amongst a sea of grey, silver and white SUVs it had the visual impact of a supernova!

And, on arrival at Goodwood, the car had the desired effect too, the bonnet removed, the car had real ‘moths to a flame’ pulling power, and several significant conversations resulted from the gaggles on interested parties the came to look and talk – and that, ultimately, was the point. This is a car enthusiast’s car, no mistake, with history, classic design and a fascinating back story to boot!

Traffic en route back to drop off the car was horrible, but the Lancia didn’t cough even once, causing quite a stir at the service station when topping off with fuel en route home – not least because I struggled to get the filler cap off!

The traffic delays en route though saw the time roll by to the point where the only way of meeting my next appointment was to conduct a Zoom call from the front seat of the car, still with the race harness on (something which caused no little amusement to the other participants on the conference video call!), the call interrupted briefly by Oliver who had seen the car pulled over as he left for the day and had assumed a breakdown had occurred!

It hadn’t, and the lateness of my return meant that I had the opportunity to had the car back to Oliver’s father Nigel, a long-time successful historic racer with a wide variety of machinery from GT40s to Lola T70s and more!

That encounter went on far longer than either of us had planned and turned into a simply delightful chat about racing past, racing present and racing future. A delightful man, the head of a delightful family and with a delightful little car being put away ready for its next racing engagement – Forza Lancia!

1969 Daytona 24 Hours

The #97 Lancia Fulvia HF Zagato entered the 1969 Daytona 24 Hours powered by the then fairly new, and essentially rally spec, 1600 cc V4 engine coupled to a 5 speed manual transmission.

In the Group 6 field, it was significantly underpowered with the team, running under the banner of US Lancia importers Algar Enterprises, leaning very heavily on as trouble-free a run as possible.

And so it would prove, the pair arrived at Daytona on the back of a similarly impressive class win at Sebring in 1968 in a standard bodied Fulvia Sport.

Magioli raced throughout the mid-late 1960s in a variety of Lancias with some notable successes including another class win, and ninth overall, in the 1970 Targa Florio, again in A Fulvia HF, together with Sandro Munari.

Pinto meanwhile competed for somewhat longer, finally hanging up his helmet after a final run in the Giro d’Italia, in another Lancia, this time though it was the mighty Stratos!

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