A 1992 ,Gebhardt C91 competing in the group C race during the Silverstone Classic 2015.
Group C was a category of motorsport, introduced by the FIA in 1982 for sports car racing, along with Group A for touring cars and Group B for GTs. It was designed to replace both Group 5 Special Production Cars (closed top touring prototypes like Porsche 935) and Group 6 Two Seater Racing Cars (open-top sportscar prototypes like Porsche 936). Group C was used in the FIA's World Endurance Championship (1982–1985), World Sports-Prototype Championship (1986–1990), World Sportscar Championship (1991–1992) and in the European Endurance Championship (1983 only). It was also used for other sports car racing series around the globe. The final year for the class came in 1993. Broadly similar rules were used in the North American IMSA Grand Touring Prototype series GTP. By 1989, the Group C series popularity was nearly as great as Formula One.[citation needed] When C1 cars were found to be breaking over the 240 miles per hour mark at Le Mans' Mulsanne Straight — the WM-Peugeot recorded the highest 407 km/h (253 mph) — the FIA revolutionized the class by attempting to turn it into a formula series to replace the C2 category (after they proved to be unreliable at endurance races). The new formula restricted the performance of cars built to the original rules (such as the Porsche 962 used by many privateers) and benefited teams using F1-sourced L engines — these latter teams being effectively the large manufacturers alone, as the new formula cars were more expensive than the C1 cars. What followed was the quick downfall of Group C, as the new engines were unaffordable for privateer teams like Spice and ADA.
Size: 4603px × 2946px
Location: Silverstone Circuit, Towcester, Northamptonshire, NN12 8TN
Photo credit: © John Gaffen 2 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 1992, c91, circuit, classic, gebhardt, group, judy, lyons, silverstone
