The Cougar C01, and its derivative, the Cougar C01B, were

Group C Group C was a category of sports car racing introduced by the FIA in 1982 and continuing until 1993, with ''Group A'' for Touring car racing, touring cars and ''Group B'' for Grand tourer, GTs. It was designed to replace both Group 5 (motorspor ...

sports car prototype race cars, designed, developed, and built by French constructor

Cougar The cougar (''Puma concolor'') (, ''Help:Pronunciation respelling key, KOO-gər''), also called puma, mountain lion, catamount and panther is a large small cat native to the Americas. It inhabits North America, North, Central America, Cent ...

in 1984, and was used in

sports car racing Sports car racing is a form of motorsport road racing that uses sports cars with two seats and enclosed wheels. They may be either purpose-built Sports prototype, sports prototypes, which are the highest level in sports car racing; or grand to ...

from 1982 to 1984. Its best result in the

World Sportscar Championship The World Sportscar Championship was the world Endurance racing (motorsport), endurance racing series run for sports car racing, sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), from 1953 World Sportscar Championship, 1953 t ...

series was a tenth-place finish 1983 1000 km of Mugello, being driven by

Yves Courage Yves may refer to: * Yves, Charente-Maritime, a commune of the Charente-Maritime department in France * ''Yves'' (single album), a single album by Loona * ''Yves'' (film), a 2019 French film People * Yves (given name), including a list of pe ...

Aldo Bertuzzi Aldo Bertuzzi (born 15 April 1961) is an Italian former Auto racing, racing driver. He raced in the European Formula 2 Championship Complete European Formula Two Championship results (:Template:Motorsport driver results legend, key) (Races in bol ...

, and

Gianni Giudici Gianni Giudici (born 10 March 1946) is an Italian racing driver from Abbiategrasso, in the Province of Milan. Career *1970–1992: Italian Touring Car Championship *1993: Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft *1994: Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterscha ...

Development history and technology

The Cougar C01 is a closed Group C prototype, was developed and built by Yves Courage in 1985, prepared for the respective races by his own racing team, Cougar, and was the first

sports prototype A sports prototype, sometimes referred to simply as a prototype, is a type of Auto racing, race car that is used in high-level categories of sports car racing. They are purpose-built auto-sports race cars, as opposed to production-car based or s ...

made by the company. It was powered by a

Formula One Formula One (F1) is the highest class of worldwide racing for open-wheel single-seater formula Auto racing, racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one ...

-derived

naturally aspirated A naturally aspirated engine, also known as a normally aspirated engine, and abbreviated to N/A or NA, is an internal combustion engine in which air intake depends solely on atmospheric pressure and does not have forced induction through a turboc ...

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

Cosworth DFL The DFV is an internal combustion engine that was originally produced by Cosworth for Formula One motor racing. The name is an abbreviation of ''Double Four Valve'', the engine being a V8 development of the earlier four-cylinder FVA, which had f ...

V8 engine A V8 engine is an eight- cylinder piston engine in which two banks of four cylinders share a common crankshaft and are arranged in a V configuration. Origins The first known V8 was the Antoinette, designed by Léon Levavasseur, a ...

, producing a respectable @ 9,500 rpm. This drives the rear wheels through a 5-speed

manual transmission A manual transmission (MT), also known as manual gearbox, standard transmission (in Canadian English, Canada, British English, the United Kingdom and American English, the United States), or stick shift (in the United States), is a multi-speed ...

. The whole car weighed . This allowed it to reach a top speed of .

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cougar C01 Le Mans Prototypes 24 Hours of Le Mans race cars Rear-wheel-drive vehicles Mid-engined cars Sports prototypes Cars introduced in 1982 C01 Group C