Gary Pearson – Jaguar D-type

My first open-wheeled car was a Lotus 22, in fact it was one of the cars used in the filming of Grand Prix. When I first got the car it still had the Jordan BRM mock-up body attached, which was discarded, binned, replaced and restored to be a conventional Lotus 22. However, my first ever race was in my father’s D-type Jaguar. I was brought up with D-types, and despite racing many other exotic cars the D-type has always been my favorite. I think I must have raced at least 10 different D-type Jaguars in my time. Considering I have been fortunate enough to have raced five different Ferrari 250 GTOs, the David Piper Porsche 917, the 1960 Le Mans-winning Ferrari Testa Rossa TR60—that was a fabulous car to drive, so very different to a regular pontoon Testa Rossa, in fact a world away in performance terms—I still come back to my greatest racecar, the D-Type Jaguar. I suppose some of the affection is in my blood because of my father’s love for the car, but it is a challenging car to drive too. I would say satisfying and great fun to handle. A well-sorted D-Type should be a perfectly balanced car. Having said that, when racing the car is always on the move, so you have to be comfortable with this attribute, it’s not like taming the car, they don’t bite, but they slide when going quickly. You have to be more at ease with it—similar to driving a Maserati 250F—another great car I’ve driven.