When the 24 Hours of Le Mans started up again after WWII, it took a few years for any one company to clearly dominate the race. The first several races were each wins for different marques, but Jaguar became the first one to win two postwar races in 1953, with the excellent C-Type racer. But, as good as the C-Type was, it was up against the technological marvel that was the Mercedes-Benz 300SL, as well as the Ferrari 375 Plus — a car that was almost more of a giant V-12 engine than it was car. So, even as the C-Type was taking an overall win in 1953, Jaguar was already working on a new version of the car.
The story of the D-Type starts with the XK120, Jaguar’s first postwar sports car. At the time, it was the fastest production car in the world, and so when Jaguar wanted to compete at Le Mans, it just made a competition version of the car (this being the C-Type). But, with the XK120 having debuted in 1948, most of the technology that went into it was prewar and by the mid ’50s there was a lot of new thinking and technology that could be applied — most importantly, a lot of airplane technology.
Continue reading for the full story.
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