Lola – The T70 & Can-Am Cars

Hardly any other British brand is as closely associated with racing cars as Lola. Founded by engineer and designer Eric Broadley, the company dedicated itself to building monopostos for formula race series, sports cars and prototypes from 1958 onwards. The company name is borrowed from a musical song that became a hit in Britain in the 1950s, “Whatever Lola wants Lola gets.” Lola often developed vehicles and chassis for customer teams. At times, for example, they equipped around half of the European Formula 3000 field. Lola was also predominantly represented as a chassis supplier in Formula 1 and Formula 2. In 1997, Lola tried its hand as a works team in the premier class of motorsport. However, it failed due to insufficient funding and a car that was developed too poorly and too quickly. This damaged the company’s reputation and led to its sale to Martin Birrane. He, too, was unable to turn the company’s fortunes around. In 2012, Lola filed for bankruptcy.

Evro Publishing from the UK specifically highlights Lola’s sports car history in the book “Lola – The T70 & Can-Am Cars”. In the 1960s, the company competed in various sports car racing series in Europe, North America and Japan. Particularly successful were the various iterations of the T70, first presented in 1965. It was available as a Spyder and a Coupé. Finally, Lola used the knowledge gained from its numerous races to develop open sports prototypes for the Can-Am series. There they competed against McLaren and Shadow. On a total of 576 pages, Gordon Jones illuminates the genesis and each individual year in detail. Under ISBN 978-1-910505-53-3, the book can be ordered directly from Evro Publishing or from well-stocked dealers.

Images: Evro Publishing, Matthias Kierse