One to Buy: 1 of 59 in Sebring Red 1974 Ford Capri RS3100
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The newly formed BMW Motorsport operation with its big budget CSL arrived on the 1973 Touring Car scene with one simple aim: to de-throne the works Ford squad that had reined supreme with its Capri RS2600 since 1971.
However, despite an array of top drivers at its disposal, BMW didn’t have things its own way until the company developed a radical aero kit that arrived during the second half of the ‘73 season. From this point on, the massively spoilered CSL that the media christened the ‘Batmobile’ established itself as the premier contender in Group 2 racing.
To hit back, Ford launched the bigger-engined Capri RS3100 in late 1973, but an Oil Crisis caused by war in the Middle East that winter saw these great rivals run much-reduced campaigns in 1974 and then drop out entirely for 1975.
Today the RS3100, of which just 256 were built, is rightly regarded as the Holy Grail of Capris and currently on offer at The Hairpin Company showroom in Compton Bassett, Wiltshire, is surely one of the best to exist: chassis BBECND25103.
Configured in the handsome combination of Sebring Red (one of 59 built), chassis ‘25103’ was supplied by Ford main agent Phillips and Geake Ltd. in Cornwall. First registered in April 1974, the car was purchased by Kelly’s Ice Cream for one of the company’s Directors.
Since then it has passed through the hands of a further three custodians, the most recent of which put the Capri through a comprehensive restoration that has resulted in a superb example of its type.
