Gebhardt JC 853: Team Labatt’s 500 hp race winning World sportscar
In
1982, the FIA World Sports Car Championship attempted to counter a
worrying climb in engine output of the Group 5 Special Production
Cars by introducing Group
C, a new category for closed
sports-prototypes (purpose built racing cars). A C2 class was created
for privateer teams and small manufacturers, with greater limits to
fuel consumption. In this lower class, most cars used either the BMW
M1 engine or the new Cosworth
DFL, the latter of which the
Gebhardt JC 853 Ford is a prime example.
Bearing
the canadian brewer’s Labatt’s colours, in the hands of Frank
Jelinski and Stanley Dickens, this car won the 1986 Monza race. The
JC853 also competed in Le Mans with Jelinski, John Graham and Nick
Adams behind the wheel. To this day minitiature scale models of the
Team Labatt Le Mans car are sold to fans and collectors all over the
world.
Gebhardt
Motorsport was founded by brothers
Günther
and Fritz
Gebhardt. The team first
entered the World
Sportscar Championship in
1984 with the BMW powered Gebhardt JC842 and the Cosworth powered
Gebhardt JC843. For 1985 and 1986 the JC853 was built utilising a 3.3
litre Ford Cosworth engine producing over 500 Hp. The car weighs just
750 kg. thanks to a closed carbon body supported by an aluminium
monocoque chassis.
In
1988 Gebhardt Motorsport sold the car to the United States only to
buy it back thirty years later. In 2019 Frits Gebhardt restored the
car back into its original ‘80’s Labatts colours. During the
Classic GP Assen the car will compete in the Group C Supercup race.
