September 2019 Classic & Sports Car 177T
he intention was to pursue
a new avenue for one of the
best up-and-coming tuners
of the 1960s, but instead the
Broadspeed GT 2+2 turned
into an abrupt cul-de-sac.
No matter. Today at Good-
wood, in the 60th anniversary year of the Mini
upon which it is based, John Fitzpatrick consid-
ers the GT ‘S’ race version with a smile. “I
remember Ralph [Broad] telling me he was going
to do it and then seeing it in the workshop,” he
says. “And it turned out to be a pretty little car.”
But not the spark Broad intended. In 1966, the
Birmingham garage owner and saloon car racing
entrant expected his Cooper ‘S’-based GT to
begin a new chapter for his growing concern,
from Johnny-come-lately ace fettler to true car
constructor. “He decided to enter it in some
races to get some publicity and I drove it,” says
‘Fitz’, as he is universally known. “But it never
really took off. BMC were dead against it, they
didn’t want to know because it wasn’t their idea.
I only raced it at a few places: Brands [Hatch],
Mallory Park, Oulton [Park] – club races.
“But it was better than Ralph driving it
because he was a complete lunatic. He’d have
been off the road. He was quick, but he wasn’t
in full control all the time...”
The pair had met in fateful circumstances
when fellow Brummie Fitz had spotted a shop-
front garage with a petrol pump on his way into
the city. He was driving the Mini his father had
promised him for his 17th birthday – if he kept
away from smoking fags and riding motorbikes.
“This scruffy looking guy in an overall came
out and started filling it up,” recalls Fitz. “Then
he looked at the exhaust pipe. One or two of my
pals had strange little cars they were always
fiddling with, and we’d fiddled with the Mini.
He went around the front and I opened the
bonnet. ‘That’s a load of crap, what’s all that
about? I can do much better,’ he said. I askedhow much that was going to cost and he said,
‘We’ll talk about that later. Leave it with me for
a couple of days.’ So I took the bus home.
“When I went back it had a different inlet
manifold, and all sorts of mods. I asked how
much and he said, ‘Go and try it, give it a bit of a
run.’ He never did charge me for it. And imme-
diately it was quick in all the sprints I was doing.”
Through Fitz’s growing enthusiasm for
motorsport, Broad was introduced to circuit
racing and the pair forged their early reputations
together in 1963 thanks to Broad’s (entirely
legal) knack for modding Minis. It was even Fitz
who suggested the Broadspeed name.
At the recommendation of Ford-bound John
Whitmore, Fitz joined Cooper for British
Saloon Car duties in ’64 – and finished second in
the points to Jim Clark’s Lotus Cortina. But he
was soon reunited with his mate. “Stuart Turner
was at BMC and he decided to back Broadspeed
for the European championship and Coopers in
the British series for ’65,” says Fitz. “He asked
me if I’d like to go back to Broadspeed to drive in
Europe, which is what I did.”
The pair would shock BMC by switching to
Ford Anglias for ’66, in which Fitz would claim
the overall BSCC title – but Broad hadn’t given
up on his parallel Mini-based avenue.
In the Goodwood sun, EOP 88D looks
entirely conventional from the front – apart
from the Weber carb trumpets poking rudely
through the bonnet. But walk around to study it
in profile and all thoughts of Mini convention
are scrapped. The fastback tail makes this a car of
two halves. Pretty? Period comparisons to an
Aston Martin DB6 in miniature were perhaps a
little kind. No wonder BMC was a tad miffed.
Following Fitz’s early-season low-key skir-
mishes, sales director – and the fastback tail’s
stylist – Tony Blore added further competitive
outings. But the wind was already blowing out of
Broad’s car-constructor ambitions. “By January
1966 he was already with Ford,” says Fitz.Main: John ‘Fitz’ Fitzpatrick
is reunited with the
Broadspeed GT ‘S’ 2+2 he
played such a big role in.
Inset: period Mallory action,
post Weber installation
Broad’s interior tweaks
included auxiliary gauges
and Broadspeed GT logo
added to a new dash
fascia, plus Restall
reclining bucket seats