Ecurie Cars' LM69 imagines an alternate history of Le Mans in 1969
The LM69 is a gorgeous racing reimagination of Jaguar's mid-engine XJ13 built to 1969 racing regulations.
The name Ecurie Ecosse may not be a name that most people are familiar with, but it's an incredibly important one in the history of racing and in particular Jaguar's history as a successful marque.
The original Ecurie Ecosse race team was founded by a couple of Scottish men in the 1950s and went on to win Le Mans outright in 1956 and 1957 in a pair of Jaguar D-Types. The team went on to enter the race several more times over the years, but effectively fizzled out by the mid-1960s.
The LM69 is built to 1969 FIA class standards, including its quad-cam V12 engine and lightweight bodywork.
During the 1960s, to coincide with the forthcoming V12-powered Jaguar E-Type, the brand began work on a Le Mans prototype racer called the XJ13 that had a midmounted 5.0-liter V12 engine and a host of other modern features for the era. The car was never fully developed and eventually crashed during a film shoot, never to be raced.
What do these two things have in common? Well, Ecurie Cars -- aka the folks who own the Ecurie Ecosse name now -- decided to recreate the XJ13 had it finished its development cycle and lined up on the grid at Le Mans in 1969. The "LM69" as it's being called was announced by the company on Sunday and is painted in a dazzling shade of Flag Blue Metallic, the official color of Ecurie Ecosse.
The end result of all of Ecurie Cars and its partners' rampant "What If?"-ing is one of the most stunning modern vintage cars to be built in the last few decades. Ecurie Cars is only making 25 of them -- enough to satisfy 1969-era FIA homologation requirements -- and is selling them for between $999,000 and $1.45 million.
The car is built to fulfill all the technical requirements necessary to pass tech at Le Mans in 1969 and true to its class, it features a closed cockpit and a 5.0-liter quad-cam V12 engine. Frankly, the only thing we don't love about it is the price and the fact that we'll never see famed Jaguar test driver Norman Dewis caning one around some backwater British test track.
The car is set to make its debut at the 2019 Concours of Elegance at Hampton Court Palace on Sept. 6.
