12 May 09
Ford Capri RS2600
The sporty one: Ford Capri RS2600 (1972-1973)
What better way to prove the Capri's sporting credentials than to go racing?
Ford, a strong believer in the motorsport religion, decided to enter its Mk1 in the European Touring Car Championship. First it had to persuade the rule-makers that the Capri was, in fact, not a sporty coupe but a four-door two-door saloon. Tricky.
Once the RS division got the nod, it set about developing the 2600. Built and developed in Germany and using the smaller Cologne V6 with fuel injection rather than the existing bigger carb-fed 3.0, the Capri not only looked the part with its muscular widened wheel arches but also went out to dominate the 1971 and 1972 Championship, humiliating BMW and its 3.0 CSi in the process.
Ford Capri Mk 2
The second one: Ford Capri Mk 2 (1974-1978)
The Mk 1 soldiered on for five years, although in 1972 it received a pair of rectangle headlamps - a look the Capri would live with for an incredible 14 years. That's because, for the second generation of Capri, Ford took the cheap option of re-skinning the Mk 1 with all-new panels and converting the Coupe to a rakish two-door hatch - much in the same way Jaguar has recently done with the XK.
It's telling that the biggest improvements to the Mk 2 were rear folding seats and the scrapping of the rough old V4 engines for a more modern overhead valve Pinto lump.
Capri sales begin to sag for the first time as more and more sophisticated alternatives came to market. The end was nigh.
