Video: The Lotus Breadvan was Britain’s answer to Ferrari’s legend

28th October 2025

Russell Campbell

British racing driver Graham Capel had a problem. He’d watched the success of the Ferrari 250 Breadvan — a low-drag skunkworks project built by Giotto Bizzarrini and Piero Drogo without the blessing of Enzo Ferrari — and wanted a piece of the action for himself.

The solution was simple: Capel would build his own Breadvan, based on Colin Chapman and Frank Costin’s Lotus Eleven design. That car had already proved itself with a 143mph top speed record in the hands of Stirling Moss at Monza in 1956 and a best-ever seventh-place finish at Le Mans in the same year. Class wins at both Le Mans and Sebring would soon follow.

But the Eleven lost its competitive edge as motorsport powered into the 1960s, which is where Capel’s idea took shape. Following the “if you can’t beat them, join them” school of racing logic, he engineered his own Breadvan using his trusty Eleven, complete with a long, low roofline and oven-door tail. The Lotus Breadvan was born.

There’s nothing like this Lotus 11 GT ‘Breadvan’

Capel raced his finished machine with real success, most notably at the 1964 BARC event here at Goodwood, where he scored second in class on its final competitive outing before the car was returned to its earlier specification.

The Coupé GT Breadvan concept might have vanished into obscurity were it not for David Cooke, who set about converting his Lotus Eleven Series 2 to Breadvan form with help from Capel himself and renowned restorer Neil Twyman.

The completed car returned to Goodwood — sporting Squadron Blue paint, period sponsor decals and a 1.5-litre Coventry Climax engine — some 50 years later for the 72^nd Members’ Meeting’s Moss Trophy. It was immediately on the pace, finishing second to a significantly more powerful 4.5-litre Aston Martin DB4 GT. Since then, the Lotus Breadvan has become a familiar star of historic grids across Europe.

That includes at the 2025 Goodwood Revival. We spoke to Capel about the birth of his Breadvan, and to Cooke about the recreation that saved the story. Finally, we joined driver William Nuthall as he prepared to race it in the Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy at this year’s event. Enjoy the video.

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