Jaguar XJR-16 returns to Road Atlanta at HSR Mitty, 30 years after its dominant win there

Exactly 30 years after a dominant win at Road Atlanta in the prime of the IMSA Camel GT era, Ross Motorsports will have a pair of the mighty Jaguar GTP machines back at the fast 2.54-mile road course north of Atlanta for the 43rd Historic Sportscar Racing (HSR) Mitty, April 21-25.

Driven by Davy Jones, the V-6 twin-turbo XJR-16 made an outstanding series debut at Road Atlanta in the IMSA Camel GT race in late April of 1991, winning the pole and securing a dominant race win. Only Chip Robinson in a Nissan NPT-91 finished on the same lap as the winning Tom Walkinshaw Racing Jaguar.

Raul Boesel, who finished third behind Jones and Robinson at Road Atlanta in a Jaguar XJR-10, was upgraded to his own XJR-16 a month later at Lime Rock Park. That is the No. 3 Jaguar Ross Motorsports and team owner/driver Malcolm Ross will race at The Mitty.

Ross is also bringing the 1991 Road Atlanta winner to The Mitty to serve as a backup and possible parts car if needed.

“This will be my first weekend in them,” said Ross, who acquired the pair of Jaguars from fellow owner/competitor Richard Eyre in England a little less than a year ago. “The 1991 Road Atlanta winner is chassis No. 191 and went on to win three more races. The XJR-16 we will be racing is chassis No. 291 that was driven by both Boesel and Martin Brundle in 1991.”

Additionally, Ross is competing in Group 3 at The Mitty at the wheel of a 1965 No. 69 Lotus 23b.

“Our Lotus has a ton of European racing history,” Ross said. “It ran with a number of different configurations and engines at various times and at one point was called the ‘Saturn’ when it ran as a closed-cockpit car in England in the late 1960s. It later won a Dutch championship as a modernized sports racer in the early 1970s before it was brought back to its original splendor. I bought it from a fellow on the West Coast named Don Stark and have been racing it for the past three years or so. It is probably my favorite overall race car we have, but then again I haven’t raced the XJR-16s yet!”