David Richards
After co-driving Ari Vatanen to the World Rally Championship title in 1981, David Richards had developed a good relationship with Rothmans, the sponsors of his Ford Escort RS1800.
The following year, Richards was helping the cigarette brand set up their Formula One team in collaboration with chassis constructors March. Despite tasting success in the Seventies (thanks to the likes of Jackie Stewart and Ronnie Peterson), March was a shadow of its former self by 1982, leading Richards to seek out an alternative path for Rothmans’ motorsport strategy.
With his ear constantly to the ground, he heard about Porsche’s plans to return to Le Mans with the 956 Group C prototype. “I spoke to Jochen Mass, one of the drivers in the [Rothmans] Formula One team,” Richards explains from the confines of his office at Prodrive headquarters in Banbury, Oxfordshire. “I said, ‘This will be far more effective for our sponsors and it will be good for you. Why don’t we try to pull this together?’”
After a meeting with the key Porsche personnel at Weissach, including Ferdinand Piëch, a deal was done and one
