Mustang has had many memorable seasons in motorsports since it launched in the 1960s, but the iconic Pony car went on a hot streak in one particular series in the mid-1980s with the help of a name that’s now synonymous with Ford racing.
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TBT: How a Partnership with Jack Roush Led to Mustang’s 1980s Racing Dynasty
Oct 22, 2024
<2 MIN READ
The Roush Protofab GTO Mustang of Jones and Dallenbach, Jr. won five times in the first nine races of the 1985 IMSA season.
Mustangs of the 1960s became forever linked with Carroll Shelby when Ford partnered with the customizer to beef up its road racing program. That, of course, resulted in the creation of the Mustang GT350 in 1965, a stripped-down Mustang 2+2 for the Sports Car Club of America circuit, and an enduring relationship between Ford and Shelby American.
Bringing back the muscle
After the end of the famed muscle car era and a decade out of factory-backed racing, Ford partnered with another big name in racing: Jack Roush and Detroit-based Roush Protofab. It is said that Roush’s contributions to Mustang’s racing legacy are as significant as what Shelby had done two decades earlier.
Ford was a decade removed from factory-backed road racing when it tapped Jack Roush to resurrect its GTO Mustang.
Fast-forward to the 1984 International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) season finale at Daytona, and Ford begins its reign atop the GTO class, as a Roush-prepared Mustang won the segment in the three-hour race at the hallowed track. Months later, Ford took its first of three consecutive wins in the season-opening 24-hour races at Daytona.
Rookie driver John Jones won the GTO class driver’s championship in 1985
The Mustang of rookie driver John Jones and Wally Dallenbach, Jr. started out red-hot at Daytona, finishing 13 laps ahead of the nearest Porsche and rapidly overtaking cars in the GTP class by the end of the marathon. Adorned in its memorable Motorcraft livery, Mustang was strong all season, taking home nine victories and the company’s first road racing manufacturer’s championship since 1970. John Jones claimed the 1985 GTO driver’s championship in his first year of IMSA competition. The season also proved to be groundbreaking, as three of Ford’s victories came from Lynn St. James, the first-ever series wins for a woman.
The winning continues
The winning continued in 1986, as the Roush Mustangs earned eight more victories in the GTO class, including the season opener at Daytona, and another manufacturer’s title for Ford. Driver Scott Pruett took seven of the wins en route to a driver’s championship, as well as the GT Endurance Championship.
Mustang’s stretch of dominance in IMSA GTO racing in the 1980s earned inclusion in the Champion Spirit livery unveiled on Mustang GT3 earlier this year.
Ford would get one more win in the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1987, with St. James, Pruett, Bill Elliott, and Tom Gloy at the wheel; and added another victory before the run ended. Both the dominant 1985 season and the aforementioned win at Daytona two years later were selected among the eight most significant moments in Mustang racing history and represented in the Champion Spirit livery featured on Ford Mustang GT3 IMSA factory race cars earlier this season.
Chasing glory at The Ring
Today, Ford is building on Mustang’s racing legacy with the new Mustang GTD. Ford is attempting to become the first American automaker to record a sub-seven-minute lap at the legendary Nürburgring Nordschleife with the Mustang GTD. Stay tuned to @FordOnline and @BlueOvalNow for updates on this monumental challenge!
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