Marino Franchitti in the Ford GT and GT40

Marino Franchitti sure knows his onions. Not just his endurance racing onions – his Blue Oval onions, and the history of the GT40 in particular. The nuggets come thick and fast; he’s even received lessons in the optimum Champagne-spraying technique from the man credited with starting the whole podium Champagne-spraying business in the first place: US racing legend and Le Mans winner Dan Gurney (also the creator of the ‘Gurney flap’). A fully paid-up ledge, and no mistake. "A guy called Phil Remington worked on the original GT40 programme," Marino says. "Now, Dan is 6ft 3in tall or something, a big guy, and he asked for more headroom. So Phil got an old street sign and welded it into the roof…" GT42 didn't have the same ring to it.

Fifty years ago, after a faltering start, Ford’s competition odyssey finally got into its stride. The US giant racked up countless racing victories, including four back-to-back at La Sarthe (1966-’69 – Gurney and AJ Foyt winning in 1967), humbling a certain high-maintenance Italian along the way to such an extent that Ferrari pretty much abandoned front-line endurance battle. It’s a winning continuum the new team – Ford Chip Ganassi Racing – is clearly hoping to pick up in two months’ time.

Photography: Richard Pardon

Before that, though, there’s Silverstone, the inaugural round of the 2016 World Endurance Championship (15th-17th April), the series that will almost certainly continue to duff up Formula One in terms of, you know, actual motor racing. At Le Mans, in June, Franchitti will co-drive car no.67 with Andy Priaulx and Harry Tincknell (one of no fewer than four Ford GTs to contest Le Mans in the GTE Pro category).

"Lots of Scotsmen have had success with Ford. It definitely resonates," Marino muses. Behind him, a dozen of his new compadres are tending to two 2016-spec Ford GT race cars, one fully liveried-up, the other menacingly (un)finished in exposed carbon fibre. Today’s focus, some weeks before the WEC circus descends at our favourite chunk of windswept Northamptonshire, is to conduct a shakedown on these brand new chassis’. So new, in fact, that one of them was only finished about six hours ago. "The guys have done an incredible job," Marino says admiringly. "They’ve worked day and night to get these cars here today."

This year’s model is one of 2016’s star cars, no question. The fact that the race car is actually less powerful than the road-going version (due at the end of the year) only amps up the anticipation and the symbiosis between road and track. But there’s an interloper here today, and it’s upstaging the newcomer. It’s an original GT40, a car whose rep is somewhere beyond iconic and whose engine needs to be heard to be believed. (Fortunately you can do just that if you watch the accompanying film at the end of this gallery… you’re welcome.)

Marino’s driven a crazy variety of historic racing cars – Maserati’s Birdcage and the Ferrari 250 GTO among them – but never an original GT40. It’s a situation TG.com sought to rectify, with help from the guys in Ford’s brilliant heritage department. Marino didn’t have long in the car, and we pretty much had to peel him out of it. But we’re glad we were there to see it, and record the moment. Over to the man himself for an adrenalin-charged rapid-fire download...

"Talk about instant gratification! I had one run so I had to get everything out of it," he says. "They’re legendary cars, and the legend is intimidating. You’re apprehensive as you approach it, but they became legendary because they were so successful and they just work. There’s direct connection between your throttle and your ear…"

Can you imagine racing one for 24 hours?

"Those guys were superhuman. They were using every bit of the track while four-wheel drifting. That’s one of the things I love about racing old cars – that skill of getting the approach to the corner then the middle of the corner just right, balancing the car all the way through.

"The slip angles are so much bigger, the car has an amazing attitude. You’ve got to affect the car’s attitude before the middle of the corner, it won’t work if you simply brake, turn, and exit. Your inputs are bigger, you’re constantly working. It’s like putting a different operating system in a computer."