Eric Broadley’s hopes of achieving success at Le Mans with the T70 was never fulfilled, but not for the want of trying. He first tried in 1963 with the Mk6GT but ended up with a wrecked car and
basically bankrupt as he had put just about
everything he had into the Mk6GT and the Le Mans
effort. But Ford came to the rescue with the GT40
project and in 1964 Eric was back at Le Mans with
three Lola built GT40s. All three cars retired and Eric
quit the partnership soon after to pursue his own
T70 project. It wasn’t until 1967 before he tried
again, this time forming a partnership with John
Surtees as Lola Racing along with Aston Martin who
would be providing the engines for the new T70
Mk3GT coupe. The Aston Martin engines proved to
be a disaster and the whole project fell apart after
Le Mans. Lola Racing continued in the Can-Am with
the new T70 Mk3B spyder, which John didn’t
particularly like, and at the end of the year Lola
Racing was no more. For 1968, Eric left Le Mans to
the privateers with their T70 Mk3GTs, but for 1969,
Eric had something special planned, a full Lola
factory effort in partnership with Paul Hawkins,
Roger Penske and Carl Haas with a three car team
of specially prepared T70 Mk3B coupes.
The new T70 Mk3B coupe wasn’t really a T70 but
basically the simplified T160 Can-Am tub with
slimmer fuel tanks to the width of the Mk3GT, and a
roof. The nose of the Mk3GT had been restyled, as
had the tail with new rear end spoiler treatment.
The only other significant changes to the bodywork
were the doors, which were no longer gull-wing but
butterfly hinged on the A-pillars instead. Eric didn’t
want to homologate the new coupe as a T160B, and
claimed the new car was simply a restyled Mk3GT
and therefore a “Mk3B” version. The FIA agreed
without asking too many questions as they really
wanted more than Porsche and Ferrari running in
the Group 5 category, especially at Le Mans.
Eric never thought he could build and sell twenty
five T160Bs anyway, but probably could have when
you consider that sixteen Mk3Bs were actually built,
such was the demand for the new coupe. First in
line was Sid Taylor with SL76/138 and then Roger
Penske with SL76/139 and SL76/140 as a spare tub
which would be specially built up for Le Mans to
driven by Mark Donohue and Paul Hawkins and
entered and run by Roger Penske. The second
factory backed car would be entered by Team
Gunston and driven by John Love and Mike
Hailwood and run by Sid Taylor with a third entry
being prepared for Piers Courage and run by Carl
Haas, the US Lola agent and importer. All three cars
would be based on the long-tail spec derived from
the Trials held on March 30th 1969 with the subject
of this history, SL76/145 which had been purchased
by Carl Haas and entered by Lola Racing for Paul
Hawkins to test and develop over the test weekend.
The Le Mans effort was based on the successful
principles applied by Ford when they won the race in
1966 with the MkII and in 1967 with the MkIV. For
endurance and reliability, the Daytona 24 Hours with
its high speed bankings, and the Sebring 12 Hours
with it’s rough, cracked and bumpy runway strips. If
you managed to get through both races in one
piece, the Le Mans Trials was next followed by the
Spa 1000 Kms for a final high-speed endurance test
before the Le Mans 24 Hours itself.
The Lola Le Mans programme couldn’t have got off
to a better start when Mark Donohue and Chuck
Parsons won the Daytona 24 Hours in Roger
Penske’s SL76/139. At Sebring though, the first
signs of the Mk3Bs achilles-heel showed up when a
rear suspension pick-up point failed on the chassis
and proved to be inaccessible during the race to
repair leading to the retirement of the Penske Mk3B.
Eric was happy though with the programme so far
and next on the list was the Le Mans Trials with the
Carl Haas owned SL76/145 which was entered by
Lola Cars for the formidable Paul Hawkins. The car
started off in standard trim, but the short “Kamm”
style tail produced too much drag and Hawkins
could barely get the car above 180mph, despite the
tall gearing on the car. It was pretty stable though
through the twisty parts, of which there is not a lot
of at Le Mans, so a new long-tail solution was
devised over the weekend.
The standard tail was cut off just behind the rear
wheels and replaced by an alloy long-tail extension,
which much to the delight of Hawkins easily gave
the car an extra 15-20mph on the Mulsanne Straight
bringing it close to the 200mph mark. And it was
just as stable through the twisty parts after
adjusting the suspension settings to suit. Hawkins
recorded the third fastest time of the weekend, five
seconds off the leading Porsche 917 of Stommelen,
but only two seconds down on the factory Matra.
Hawkins though was faster than all the factory longtail
Porsche 908s.
The Le Mans test weekend had went a lot better
than expected and coupled with what had been
learned from the Daytona and Sebring races with Le
Mans partner Roger Penske, Eric felt more confident
than ever that he could tackle and possibly win the
Le Mans 24 Hours.
Eric’s Le Mans dreams came to an end shortly after
the Le Mans test weekend when Roger Penske
informed him his Mk3B had been stolen. The rig, the
car, all the equipment, in effect, his entire team had
been stolen from an overnight stop on the way back
from Florida to the team’s headquarters in
Pennsylvania after the race at Sebring. It was all
eventually recovered, stripped and submerged in
Lake Michigan with the Mk3B sitting on top of the
rig. Without Penske, Eric wasn’t interested in Le
Mans anymore, and neither was Carl Haas who
immediately sold SL76/145 to Scuderia Filipinetti
through Lola’s European agent, Jo Bonnier.
The car was then rebuilt to standard Mk3B spec with
standard bodywork and was delivered directly to the
team at Brands Hatch three days later where it was
entered in the BOAC 500 for Jo Bonnier and Herbert
Muller. SL76/145 was one of six Mk3Bs entered in
the race, and all featured stronger top links to the
front suspension to improve stability under braking.
The Filipinetti entry was the quickest Mk3B in Friday
qualifying, despite having never turned a wheel
before practice, and after Saturday qualifying
Bonnier had posted third fastest time behind the
Group 6 cars of Siffert in the Porsche 908/02 and
Chris Amon in the Ferrari 312P. At the start, Amon
led, out dragging Bonnier into Paddock, and Siffert
then scuttled up the inside of Bonnier on the run up
to Druids to take second. At the end of the first lap,
Amon and Siffert were pulling away with Bonnier
leading the rest of the field. By lap five a water
pump drive belt came off and nine minutes were lost
in the pits replacing it. More pit-stops were then
required to fix overheating problems, but by now Jo
was well down the field. He then picked up a
puncture. Despite these earlier stops, Bonnier had
SL76/145 running like a train, and with less than an
hour to go, the car was running well. Bonnier
though was pushing too hard, rushing into Paddock
on the limit, leaving his braking to the last moment,
and passing back markers right and left, but as he
swept through Paddock Bend, he ran wide when a
rear suspension top-link broke and the car launched
itself off the safety bank and cartwheeled over the
Armco barrier behind the pits to come to rest upside
down. Bonnier climbed out unharmed.
After the crash at Brands Hatch, SL76/145 was
returned to Lola and after being examined, it was
discovered that the damage to the car was not as
bad as first thought. It was stripped, with the engine
and gearbox used in the build-up of SL76/151 for
Filipinetti. This car, along with the damaged bare tub
of SL76/145, was then delivered to the team in late
April ’69. Filipinetti raced SL76/151 throughout 1969
with the bare tub of SL76/145 seeing no use
whatsoever, nor was any attempt made to re-skin or
properly repair the damaged tub.
In July 1970 SL76/145 was back at Le Mans, this
time leased to Solar Productions as a back-up stunt
car for Steve McQueen’s film “Le Mans”. Right from
the start of the project it had been decided at least
two major accidents would feature in the film
involving one car each from the Gulf-Porsche and
Scuderia Ferrari teams.
These cars though would be stunt-cars; Lola T70s
dressed up to look like the real thing. Things got
complicated though when Ferrari refused to get
involved in any way shape or form or provide cars,
for in the script his team wasn’t going to win.
David Piper then suggested to McQueen that T70
Mk3s and Mk3Bs could be converted to look like the
Ferrari 512S as their wheelbases were very close to
each other. Piper then started sourcing old T70
coupes acquiring cars from Techspeed, Ulf Norinder,
Sid Taylor and Mike de Udy.
Through Filipinetti mechanic Franco Sbarro the bare
tub of SL76/145 was acquired and repaired as a
rolling chassis to act as one of the stunt cars to be
wrecked in the film. Given its fate, this repair work
was done to a mediocre standard, painted grey and
was fitted with old and worn out suspension and
steering.
As fate would have it, Sbarro could also supply two
Filipinetti 512S long-tails which had run at Le Mans
and the Ecurie Francorchamps unbuilt spare chassis.
McQueen now had far too many T70s and now with
the luxury of being able to convert race ready T70s
into stunt-cars, saw no real use for SL76/145 and it
was decided to let it go.
It was sold to Herrman “Herr” von Wolfe, a German
BP Oil rep working in Europe who at the time was
resident at the Hotel Central in the City of Le Mans.
Quite what he intended to do with the rolling chassis
isn’t known, other than a suggestion he simply
wanted to have a piece of movie memorabilia
connected with McQueen. He did nothing with the
rolling chassis and sold it to Mac McClendon in 1979.
Mac registered the chassis with the California Vehicle
Licensing Authority in 1984 and kept it for 25 years
under wraps. He then sold it to the current owner,
Belgian collector and historic racer Marc Devis in
April 2010 who then fully restored the car over five
years in 1969 BOAC 500 Filipinetti livery.
Shortly after buying the rolling chassis, Marc
commissioned Mac to re-skin the tub retaining the
original interior basic chassis and original front and
rear bulkheads. The old worn suspension was refitted
for transport purposes only along with a new
red body, new interior and glass, and new wheels.
Although no engine and transmission was fitted, the
front mounted radiator and its alloy ducting was
replaced. It was then crated up along with the old
chassis skinning and exported to Europe.
Marc then commissioned Simpson Engineering in
the UK to rebuild the car to proper race spec with
the work overseen by T70 specialist and restorer
Clive Robinson with the work to be completed in
time for the 2012 Le Mans Classic. However, this job
proved to be far bigger than envisaged in the time
allowed as several problems had surfaced which
would need some time to remedy properly.
First and foremost, the chassis dimensions weren’t
quite right, in places by as much as plus or minus 2
to 5 millimetres. This was hardly surprising as the
tub had never really been properly re-jigged and
repaired by either Franco Sbarro, whose remit for
the chassis was as a stunt-car, or Mac McClendon
whose remit was simply to re-skin the tub for
transport. The second problem was the original rear
subframe, the top-links of which had been
strengthened with riveted and welded steel plates
after the rear suspension failure during the ’69
BOAC 500 which led to its accident. All the Mk3Bs in
the race suffered this problem and all subsequently
had their rear sub-frames strengthened in the same
way. In the interest of safety, the car was
dismantled, the tub stripped, re-jigged and reskinned
and fitted with a new rear subframe. This
work was carried out by Peter Chambers in the UK.
The rebuilt tub was painted in the traditional gloss
grey used by Lola Cars and was then fitted with new
suspension, steering and a freshly built 5.0 litre
Chevrolet V8 engine and transmission. The new
body fitted by Mac McClendon was re-fitted.
The whole restoration process was intended to be
completed in time for the 2015 historic racing
season, and was on schedule until delayed by the
late arrival of the correct exhausts and shockers.
This led to an initial shakedown test at Spa being
cancelled with Marc choosing to be patient and not
rushing the cars return to the track.
By August 2015, the car was finally ready to take
part in the Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring.
For the first time in 46 years, SL76/145 was back on
track and ready to take part in only its second ever
race. In the first race the car retired early in the first
couple of laps when the alternator quit. In the
second race Marc started 20th and last at the back
of the grid but managed to storm through the pack
and finish 6th. It was a spectacular return to
competition for SL76/145 after 46 lost years.
Early 1970s:
28/03/69: Lola Racing Cars, Yeovil Rd, Slough, England, UK
• driven by Paul Hawkins ’69 Le Mans Trials
13/04/69: Scuderia Filipinetti, Switzerland
• via Haas/Bonnier Lola Agency
• invoiced on this date
• fitted with Bartz-Chevrolet 305cid 5.0 litre engine no. 305-13
• fitted with Hewland LG600-154 gearbox
• driven by Jo Bonnier & Herbert Muller
• crashed by Bonnier, BOAC 500, Brands Hatch
• returned to Lola for repair stripped of engine and box for build-up of SL76/151
• repaired rolling chassis returned to Filipinetti - delivered along with SL76/151
• retained as spare in storage
/06/70: Solar Productions, Le Village, Le Mans, France
• leasing arrangement
• rolling chassis only - as back up stunt car - never used
• sold on behalf of Scuderia Filipinetti
23/07/70: H. von Wolfe, Hotel Centrale, Le Mans, France
• purchased rolling chassis and spares
01/02/79: McClendon International, Santa Ana, California, USA
• in storage
• registered as legal owner with CVLA in 1984
/. /04/10: Marc Devis, Belgium
• current owner
• purchased rolling chassis and spares from Mac McClendon
• restoration supervised by Peter Chambers Automotive, UK
• raced 2015 Oldtimer GP, Nurburgring
• first race since 1969 BOAC 1000 Kms
• raced 2016/18 Classic Endurance Racing series
Lola Racing Cars
30/03/69: Le Mans Trials, France #4 P.Hawkins 3rd 3m35.300s
Scuderia Filipinetti
13/04/69: BOAC 500, Brands Hatch #3 J.Bonnier/H.Muller 20th 173 laps
Retired from competition.
