Farewell Ford GTs at Le Mans with Mark Rushbrook, Joey Hand and Mike Hull

Image by Ehrhardt/LAT


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By: Marshall Pruett June 13, 2019 10:17 AM

The final laps of Ford’s factory GT program in Europe will be turned on Sunday at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. A swift four-year program has come and gone for the automotive giant, its team partner Chip Ganassi Racing, Ford GT manufacturer Multimatic, engine supplier Roush Yates, and all of the vendors who’ve written new chapters in the brand’s glorious history in France.

Speaking with Ford Performance boss Mark Rushbrook, star driver Joey Hand, and Ford CGR managing director Mike Hull on the eve of the project’s farewell to Le Mans, the three men touched on a variety of memories during more than an hour of conversations.

For Rushbrook, who was at the leading edge of the GT’s birth as a road and race car, the project has been a major part of his day-to-day life.

“What I saw coming into this job as the Motorsports Engineering Manager back in December of 2013, it was already an idea,” he said. “It wasn’t approved at that point in time, but it was an idea. And that was part of my reason to accept the job, was knowing that there might be the possibility to work on a Ford GT program, on a racing program, and going back to Le Mans. So the official concept was there already by the end of 2013, and we worked through and got approval in 2014, and it was just tremendous to be a part of that and putting together the blocks of what would ultimately become the GT Racing Program, and great partners like Multimatic, and Chip Ganassi Racing, and Roush Yates Engines to be able to have it become a reality.

“It’s something that, because at that point in June of 2015, it’s something that we had been working on for over a year and a half, but we couldn’t openly talk about it and had to keep it secret for so long. But still many people knew that we were doing it, or thought that we were doing it, but we could never confirm it. So in some sense it was a big relief to finally be able to tell the world what we’d been working on, and what they had suspected, and that it was true, and that we would as a company and with great partners be coming back the following year in 2016 to race the new Ford GT, and try to celebrate the 50-year anniversary of the ’66 win.”

Hand, Muller and Bourdais celebrate a successful return for the Blue Oval in 2016. Image by Mauger/LAT


With the 50th anniversary as the first milestone for Le Mans, the team’s memorable 1-3 finish, with Hand and teammates Dirk Muller and Le Mans native Sebastien Bourdais standing on the top step of the podium in 2016, set the standard for which the Ford CGR outfit hopes to repeat this weekend.

Coming into the 2019 event, Ford has its first customer GT in the field, purchased by owner/driver Ben Keating. While Ford will say goodbye to its factory program at Le Mans, Rushbrook and Multimatic are working hard to identify more Keatings to buy and race the GTs as privateers.

“Yeah, there’s been great interest in the cars and in racing them,” he said. “But just like it took time to set up the initial program, [there’s] the importance of the right partners and the right people. That’s where we’ve been going slow, to make sure that we find the right pairings. Because we believe these cars, we’re biased obviously, but we believe these cars are very, very special and want to make sure they have the right home and the right way to continue on track in the future. So, stay tuned. More to come.”

As a young IndyCar prospect, Hand dreamt of driving for Chip Ganassi. More than a decade later, in the realm of sports cars, he’d get his chance in IMSA with Ganassi’s Ford Daytona Prototypes. The 2015 DP union predated the GT program, giving the Californian an inside track when the changeover took place.

“I always wanted to be, ever since the IndyCar days when I was chasing Chip and Mike Hull around Laguna Seca, watching [Alex] Zanardi, [Jimmy] Vasser and [Juan] Montoya drive there,”he said. “I mean, I was always … I’ve been chasing the Ganassi thing for a while. So, to drive on that team was basically a dream, but I never knew … when I was young I didn’t know why exactly that team was so good. And when you get into the program, you recognized really quick that it’s about the people.”

After Le Mans, Hand and the IMSA Ford GT team have a few months to complete back home as they pursue the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GT Le Mans title. The people he’s come to befriend at Ford CGR and its many partners will be the biggest loss once the project ends in October at Petit Le Mans.

“It’s very strongly about the people and you recognize that, holy cow! There’s guys here, not just a couple, but most of the place, you have guys at Chip Ganassi Racing that they didn’t just end up at the top of the heap at the shop. They evolved. Like Mike Hull. He was a former Formula Ford mechanic years ago, and he worked his way up. And now he’s running Chip Ganassi Racing, and has been for a while,” Hand continued.

“It’s one of the most successful race teams in the history of racing. And that’s the kind of guys you have. My car chief, Tyler Rees, has worked his way up, and was on the IndyCar program, then came back for the Ford GT program. Michael O’Gara, he’s been all over. It was pretty smart of Ford to, first of all, hook up with Chip Ganassi Racing. But then there’s a lot of parts to this that a lot of people don’t know about.

“Multimatic was the main designer of the car, with Larry Holt and his crew. And then, Ford Performance is involved, but then so is Roush Yates engines. So there’s so many little things you could have a lot of difficulties with working with, for four or five huge entities. But … it’s the guys you would have over for a barbecue, because it truly is. And I keep telling guys, you come to California, my house is open. We’re going to do something at Hand Splash. We’re going to barbecue some Smash burgers at Hand Splash.”

As a sports car champion and winner of every major endurance race, Hand has driven for multiple auto manufacturers, and hates to think of the day where his Ford CGR crew won’t be in charge of the cars he pilots.

“It really is a mega team. The team that you want to be on, because I’m all about the comfort, right? And I’m a big believer that comfort brings results. And it doesn’t just mean the car’s working for you, and all that. It also means that, when you get out of the car, you feel like everybody is on your side,” he said.

“No matter if you did a good job, or not so good job. And that’s the way these guys are. They’re more uplifting than any program I’ve been with. They’re always, like, ‘Hey, don’t worry about it, man. We’re going to get ’em.’ If you say, ‘Hey, I need something in the cockpit changed,’ there’s no, ‘Oh, man, we got to work.’ No. It’s like, ‘Is that going to make us faster? Great. Let’s do it. Perfect. No problem. Do it.’

Looking a decade or two ahead, Hand believes the Ford CGR program deserves the same kind of reverie the factory Ford GT40s from the 1960s receives.

“It is a great group of guys, and you couldn’t write it. But when you do read some of the history, you’re not far off from what happened in the ’60s, to be honest,” he said. “Couple groups came together, couple key players. A lot of good people, and huge success. So, yeah. It’s a group of people that I would love to run my career out with, that’s for sure.”

Just as Hand had visions of competing for CGR, Hull’s dreams, dating back to his Southern California childhood, included Le Mans. Having an opportunity to assemble and steer the effort to France and vie for victory has, like so many involved in the four-year project, been filled with wonderment.