50 YEARS OF THE FORD CAPRIGROUP 5/ZAKSPEED
Don’t be fooled by the photos of flames licking from the exhaust.
The Zakspeed Capri wasn’t just about brute force. The Group 5 cars
the factory team raced in the DRM German racing championship from
1978 to 1983 were high-tech aluminium-spaceframe silhouette racers
boasting ground-effect aerodynamics and water-cooled brakes.
“Zakspeed came up with a lot of good ideas; they were self-taught guys
who learned by doing,” recalls Klaus Ludwig, who won the 1981 DRM
crown with the team. “The Capri had a lot of power – and a lot of flames
- from those little turbocharged engines, and massive downforce from
the underfloor with plastic skirts running front to rear.”
At least it did at the start of the races. That goes for the power and
the downforce. As the synthetic skirts started to wear the car would
lose downforce. Power would be lost by design in the name of reliability.
“With those cars you got your one set of qualifying tyres and big
boost numbers,” adds Ludwig. “You did your lap, and then the engine
was changed for the race. I’d do a couple of quick laps after the start
and then turn the engine down to try to bring it home. Reliability
wasn’t always the best, but I wanted to win races and was happy to
do so by half a second.”
Ludwig should have won the DRM title in his first year with the Ford
Capri III Turbo in 1980. The team was picked up on a new rear wing at
the opening round at Zolder and opted to race under appeal there and in
round two at the Nurburgring. Even though he went on to win five races,
the points lost after the appeal was turned down cost Ludwig the title.
Zakspeed had entered the top class of the DRM, Division 1, in 1980
with a 1.7-litre car boasting around 650bhp in race trim, but for the
following year Ludwig drove in the more competitive secondary
division with a further evolution of the 1.4-litre Capri that the team
had raced from 1978. Victory in 10 of the 16 separate races for the up
to two-litre cars gave him the overall title.
“From today’s point of view, it was a dangerous little car,” he says,
“but it had unbelievable power and was a lot of fun to drive.”“WITH THOSE CARS YOU GOT ONE
SET OF QUALIFYING TYRES AND
BIG BOOST NUMBERS”
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