In two eventful seasons – 1963 and 1964 – the Cortina changed the face of Ford in motorsport paving the way for even grater successes in sports car racing, and in Formula One. First in rallying, then in saloon car racing, the Cortina immediately punched above its weight. Not only did F1 World Champion Jim Clark use a Lotus-Cortina to win the British Saloon Car Championship in 1964, but a team of factory-prepared Cortina GTs also dominated the world’s most demanding rally – the East African Safari.

In motor racing the 1558cc, twin-cam engined, Lotus-Cortina showed that the use of a powerful engine, strong but lightweight construction and driver-friendly roadholding could be a winning combination. Lotus-Cortinas won scores of races - not only in Britain, but in Europe and in North America – and on the rare occasions when they were beaten it was invariably by 4.7-litre or even 7.0-litre V8 engined cars which also carried a Ford badge.

Even before the Lotus-Cortina arrived on the tracks, the Cortina GT was a race-winning car, not only in Britain (where Jack Sears won the British Championship) but in the prestigious 12 Hour race at Marlboro in the USA. In its first full season, 1964, not only did Jim Clark’s Team Lotus entry win the British Championship, but Sir John Whitmore’s Alan Mann Racing example won five events in Europe.

In Britain, these cars won their Championship class once again in 1965, while in Europe Sir John Whitmore completely dominated the European Saloon Car Series, to win convincingly. It was much the same story in 1966, where the Sir John Whitmore/Alan Mann combination won four more races outright, and in

Britain cars driven by Jim Clark won three races, and the 2-litre class in the Championship.

New-shape Mk IIs also raced successfully in 1967 (new regulations allowed them to use the new Ford FVA Formula 2 engine) and were always pace-setters until the smaller and even more agile Escort Twin-Cam was homologated. This car owed much of its early success to the use of well-proven Cortina and Lotus-Cortina engine, drive line and suspension components.

The Ford Motorsport centre at Boreham was set up in 1963 to campaign the Cortina as a rally car. Even in this first season the Cortina GT was a successful car at 1.6-litre class level – one high point being third place overall in the Swedish Midnight Sun event.

Outright victories soon followed. In 1964, not only did Vic Elford use a Cortina GT to win the fast and furious French Alpine rally, in the heat and altitude of southern France, but Kenya’s Ford importer Peter Hughes’s GT won the prestigious East African Safari rally. Not only that, but the team of ‘works’ GTs also won the Manufacturers’ team prize too. It was the first time that victory had been achieved by European-prepared cars.

The stream of rallying victories then increased. Roger Clark’s privately-prepared Cortina GT won the Scottish rally in 1964 and 1965 and the 1965 Gulf-London event, the Elford/Seigle-Morris Lotus-Cortina lifted the Handicap Category of the 1964 Tour de France and Clark’s Lotus-Cortina won the Welsh rally of 1965. Cortinas were also prominent in the new TV Rallycross events.

In 1966 and 1967 Bengt Soderstrom used the latest Lotus-Cortinas, complete with revised rear suspension, to win three world-class rallies – the Greek Acropolis, the British RAC, and the Swedish, while Ove Anderson also won the marathon Gulf-London rally later in 1967. This machine was now a regular winner in every type of production-car motorsport – whether on smooth surfaces, or in dreadfully rough conditions.

Even so, the Lotus-Cortina was still not at its peak when Ford introduced an even better rally car – the Escort Twin-Cam, which inherited all the virtues of the Cortina - pace, strength and durability – in a smaller and even more versatile package.

In 1967 and 1968, there was more Safari success with Vic Preston Junior and Peter Huth taking second places in each of those two events. At the very end of their rallying career, the Mk II Lotus-Cortinas were denied of outright success in the first-ever London – Sydney Marathon rally, by a cruel engine failure to Roger Clark’s car in the final hours.

In the 1970s later-model Cortinas were little used in motor sport, where the regulations favoured specialised, limited-production models, yet just for fun (and charity) Ford supported one-model races in Britain and in Europe for Mk III Cortinas, where racing drivers like John Surtees, Jody Scheckter and Frank Gardner kept the crowds entertained.

The Escort, which had followed the Cortina, would enhance Ford’s sporting reputation even further, while the Sierra would later become the world’s best racing saloon car in the 1980s.