You can see it in the drawings: slice a D-type in half either way and you’ll get an ellipse. During WWII Jaguar built bomber wings, and it’s hard not to connect those streamlined, skinned-alloy structures with Malcolm Sayer’s sleek D-type. If you’re determined to retain your grip on Le Mans and you don’t have the resources for a new engine, you have only two avenues: cut weight and slash drag. Aiming for both, Sayer’s incremental ‘test, refine, test again’ methods steadily homed in on the taut curves we know as the greatest Fifties Le Mans car – a device that would bring another three wins to Browns Lane.

When Sayer and engineering wizard Bill Heynes discussed options in late ’53 – for a 1954 entry! – they chose a folded, riveted and welded centre section. It’s a semi-monocoque: a front ‘subframe’ carrying engine and wishbones runs back inside the tub for confidence. But the rear suspension (trailing arms and torsion bars like the C) hangs directly on the rear bulkhead while body, tank and spare wheel are cantilevered from it, too. Result – rigidity, small cross-section (vital for drag) and a smooth underbelly.

“It’s a toolroom car,” says David Morris, restorer and racer whose family for many years owned OKV3, one of the 1954 Le Mans team cars. “It’s superbly put together and with a good driver it’s virtually unbreakable. To me the original 3.4 is the sweeter engine but of course the 3.8 has the sheer power.”