Before there were Shelby and Miles, there were Roy Lunn and John Wyer, the original developers of the Ford GT. This rare film details the first year of the historic program.

Courtesy of the Ford Heritage film archive at  the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu, we’re sharing this rare film with the title Project 200. Here we get a detailed look inside the little-known (here in the USA, anyway) first year for the Ford GT40 program. Using Eric Broadley’s Lola Mk 6 Ford as a baseline, the Ford GT came to life in just 11 months, first at the Lola shops in Bromley, then at Ford Advanced Vehicles (FAV) in Slough, near Heathrow Airport in London. Ford engineer Roy Lunn and former Aston Martin team manager John Wyer headed the operation, under the direction of Ford engineering chief Harley Copp.

From its debut in May at the Nürburgring the team went through major struggles in 1964. with a string of component failures and DNFs. One encouraging moment came at Le Mans, where the team car of Richie Ginther and Masten Gregory led a number of laps before falling out with a busted gearbox. At the end of the troubled season, the racing operations were handed over to Shelby American in Los Angeles, though car construction remained at FAV in Slough. The film gives us a rare glimpse at the challenging early days that put the historic GT40 program in motion. Video below.