RETURN OF THE COOPER
When it was announced in July 1990, it would have been hard to predict the enormous impact the RSP Cooper would have, not only on the course the Mini would take but also on how both enthusiast and the general public viewed the car. Announced as a very limited edition, it later became clear that the new ‘mainstream’ Cooper was ready and waiting in the wings. The sporting Mini was back with a bang.
The Cooper name had disappeared from the UK Mini range in 1971 with the demise of MkIII Cooper S. And by 1990, the last Mini to leave the factory fitted with a 1275cc engine was almost ten years old – the 1275GT had finally gone out of production in 1980 as the Metro hit the showrooms.
Special editions had become a staple of the Mini range. Built around the base models and their 998cc engines, they usually relied on upmarket trim packages, unique paint and decal sets to add buyer appeal to the Mini, which had seen sales dwindle in the face of more modern competition. In the early 1970s, Mini sales had been running at around 300,000 per year worldwide – by 1985, this was down to around 35,000.
If Rover had chosen to ignore the Mini’s sporting heritage during the 80s, there was one man who hadn’t. John Cooper had continued to produce Rover-authorised tuning packages for the Mini and had sold hundreds both in the UK and worldwide – predominantly in Japan, which at this
