Some cars earn their place in history with one race. The Ford GT40 did it in six years, won Le Mans four times, and left a legacy so powerful that sixty years later, people are still building cars in its honour. One of those people runs a company in South Africa, and what they are working on is genuinely exciting.

The Car That Started It All

To understand why the Cape Advanced Vehicles Special Project matters, you need to understand what the Ford GT40 actually was. Built from 1964 to 1969, the GT40 was born out of one of the most famous rivalries in motorsport history. Henry Ford II wanted to buy Ferrari. Enzo Ferrari walked away from the deal at the last moment. Ford's response was to build a car specifically designed to destroy Ferrari at Le Mans, and it worked.

At the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans, Ford crossed the finish line first, second, and third. Ferrari was beaten comprehensively, and the GT40 became an icon overnight. The car stood just 40 inches tall, ran a big-block V8, and was engineered with a single purpose. Its Mk II variant introduced prominent rear deck air intakes and four vertical taillights mounted at the back, details so distinctive that they became the car's visual signature. In six years of competition, the GT40 won Le Mans four consecutive times between 1966 and 1969. No car has made a more dramatic point in endurance racing history.

What Cape Advanced Vehicles Is Building

Cape Advanced Vehicles, based in South Africa, has spent 27 years building continuation GT40s of exceptional quality. Four generations of refinement and more than a quarter century of experience with a single platform. Now, for the first time, they are stepping beyond recreation into original territory, and they are calling it the Special Project.

Work on this car began in late 2024. What has emerged from the teasers so far is a mid-engine supercar with a character that is unmistakably rooted in the GT40 era. The four vertical taillights are back, this time mounted on a CNC-machined aluminium cantilever. A direct tribute to the Mk I layout. The rear deck carries twin bulbous air intakes, a clear reference to the Le Mans-winning Mk II. The car wears light blue paint with a gold racing number on the door, a deliberate nod to the 1966 Le Mans podium finishers.

Beneath the bodywork, the Special Project is built around a carbon fibre and aluminium monocoque with an integrated roof structure and bolt-on subframes front and rear. It is mid-engined and V8-powered. CAV is targeting 500 hp in naturally aspirated form, with a forced induction version pushing that figure to 800 hp. The official debut is set for June 18, 2026, exactly 60 years to the day since Ford's historic 1-2-3 finish at the Circuit de la Sarthe.

Why a Car Like This Matters

Ford has not built a new GT since the second-generation model ended production in 2022. There is no replacement on the horizon, and no official successor has been announced. That leaves a genuine gap in the market, a space that CAV is uniquely positioned to fill. No other manufacturer has spent nearly three decades living inside the GT40's DNA the way this company has.

The timing is deliberate and pointed. Debuting on the 60th anniversary of Le Mans 1966 is not a coincidence. It is a statement about legacy, continuity, and the kind of passion that keeps a car relevant across six decades. The boutique supercar market is growing among serious collectors worldwide, and heritage-driven machines built in limited numbers are commanding exactly the kind of attention and value that make them meaningful investments.

At F1rst Motors, we have always believed that the most compelling supercars carry a story as powerful as their performance figures. The CAV Special Project is not trying to be the fastest car on the road. It is trying to be the most honest, a machine built by people who understand the GT40 better than almost anyone alive, making a successor on their own terms. That is a rare thing.