The cars
The GT6's history can be traced back to 1963 when Giovanni Michelotti was commissioned to design a GT version of their Spitfire 4. Towards the end of 1963 a prototype Spitfire GT was returned to England for evaluation. Although the styling of the vehicle was a success the 1147 cc (70 cu in) Spitfire power unit could not cope with the extra weight of the GT body shell and the resulting performance was poor. In 1964 the Triumph racing-programme produced fiberglass copies of the Spitfire GT's fastback. These were fitted to race-modified Spitfires. The fastback was though to provide aerodynamic benefits over the standard car. The race program was a success culminating in a class win at the 1965 Le Mans 24 Hour race. This success led Triumph to revive the Spitfire GT project and to overcome the lack of performance the 6 cylinder 2 Litre engine that was currently being fitted to the Vitesse was installed in the new fastback car. Although Triumph made good use of the Le Mans success in its marketing for the GT6 - the GT6 was developed entirely separately to the Le Mans Spitfires.