Everyone knows that front-engine racecars went out of fashion years ago, just about when the 1950s stepped into a mini skirt and became the swinging ’60s, in fact. But not everybody likes to put the horse behind the cart, and every now and then there’s a slight revival. Examples are the Panoz Sports Prototypes of the early 2000s, or the more recent Nissan GT-R LM. Yet it’s not just quirky Le Mans racers that have kept the front-engine design philosophy alive for, as many readers will be aware, in the UK there’s a championship dedicated to such cars.
Clubmans has been around since 1965 and the category now offers those with a technical and creative approach to motorsport a place to let their imaginations run wild, the only proviso being the engine must remain in front of the driver.
That said, these days the cars are not strictly front-engined, as the powerplants are often positioned in the middle of the chassis.
‘Obviously, you want to get the engine as far back as you can, and we do get a really nice weight distribution, which is about the same as a single seater, with around 65 per cent to the rear,’ says Peter Richings, vice chairman and competitions secretary of the Clubmans Register.
‘Obviously, you want to get the engine as far back as you can, and we do get a really nice weight distribution’
Peter Richings, vice chairman and competitions secretary of the Clubmans Register
Owner driver formula
But beyond having the engine ahead of the driver – who, as you will have surmised, tends to sit right at the back of the car – there really isn’t a whole lot of regulation in Clubmans Sports Prototypes, which means it’s ideal for a certain kind of competitor.
‘It’s always been a category where we’ve encouraged owner drivers, people that develop their own cars, even build their own cars. There’s not so many who arrive and drive cars that are prepared by somebody else,’ notes Richings, who has
