A Lola T70 Mk3B goes of the track during the FIA Masters Historic Sports Car Race, at the 2015 Silverstone Classic.
The Lola T70 was built for sports car racing, popular in the mid to late 1960s. Developed by Lola Cars in 1965 in Great Britain. Early success came when Walt Hansgen won the Monterey Grand Prix, at Laguna Seca Raceway, on October 17, 1965, driving John Mecom's Lola T70-Ford. In 1966, the hot setup for the Can-Am was a T70 Chevrolet. Winning five of six races during the year. John Surtees was the champion and Dan Gurney drove the only Ford powered car ever to win a Can-Am race. In 1967, no one could compete with the new M6 McLaren. The T70 was quite popular, with more than 100 examples of the vehicle being built in three versions. The first version, besides the original factory car, was the open-roofed Mk II, joined by the Coupé-version Mk III, and a slightly updated version, the Mk IIIB. The T70 was replaced in the Can-Am by the lighter Lola the FIA changed the rules for sports car racing that came into effect for 1968, limiting the engine size of prototypes to three liters, sportscars with up to 5000cc engines were allowed if at least fifty were made. This rule allowed the popular yet outdated Ford GT40 and Lola T70s to continue racing. The Fords won Le Mans again in 1968 and 1969, while the T70's only big endurance win came in the 1969 24 Hours of Daytona where they finished first and second. The winning car was the Sunoco Lola T70-Chevrolet of Mark Donohue and Chuck Parsons. When the minimum number was lowered to twenty five for 1969, the more modern Porsche 917 and Ferrari 512 were homologated (sanctioned), and outran the older Lolas and Fords. The T70 was first produced in open-top "spyder" configuration. Chevrolet powered coupes tended to suffer reliability problems when racing in Europe, in part due to the grade of fuel allowed. In modern historic racing these engines show much improved reliability due to a number of factors: in modern historic racing they use parts unavailable in the 1960s, and fuel quality is better than the historically poor fue
Size: 3965px × 2908px
Location: Silverstone Circuit, Towcester, Northamptonshire, NN12 8TN
Photo credit: © John Gaffen / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 2015, car, circuit, classic, fia, historic, lola, masters, mk3b, race, silverstone, sports, t70
