Ford's entry at the 1966 Le Mans 24-hours is the strongest works entry ever seen: no less than 8 factory Fords MkIIA are sent to La Sarthe.  The #1, #2 and #3 are entries by Shelby American Inc., aligning 3 American and 3 New Zealand drivers. (It's not clear why Lloyd Ruby, winner at Daytona and Sebring was not selected by Carroll Shelby). The #4, #5 and #6 are entries by Holman & Moody using four American racers (among them NASCAR specialist Dick Hutcherson), one Australian and one Belgian. Finally Alan Mann Racing Ltd., located in England, shows with two cars (#7 and #8) with its traditional racers: F1-world champion and Indianapolis 500 winner Graham Hill, Sir John Whitmore, dr. Dick Thompson and Australian Frank Gardner. Thompson is the last minute substitute for wonder boy Jackie Stewart. On last day's practice he hurts the #63 Ford GT40 of Scuderia Bear, entered for Richard Holqvist (US), taking the curbs at unbelievable slow speed. The GT40 is written off and will no start. Already the day before several racers several racers complained the ACO officials (organisers) about Holqvist's way of driving. The accident is just one of those things, but a zealous official remarks his superior that neither dr. Thompson nor Alan Mann reported the accident to the race direction. At general stupefaction that race direction decides to take Alan Mann's #7 out of the race for ...délit de fuite. Ford's answer, however, stupefies even more. PR-manager Leo Beebe informs ACO that if the #7 is taken out, Ford will retire all its machines. Up from now ACO tries not to loose its face, especially since Henry Ford II is present to give the start. The American press - massively present around the track - points (rightly) out that ACO's decision is absolutely ridiculous. At ACO they understand that if Ford goes they'll have no longer a race, since everybody came to here to watch the Ford-Ferrari battle. So the geezers of ACO continue ridiculing themselves by what they believe is a Salmon's sentence: Alan Mann has to fine the princely sum of ONE dollar, but bold Dickie Thompson needs to be replaced by another driver. And yes, mr. Ford, the circuit can be closed to give your suitable co-driver a chance to qualify.
Alan Mann thus contacts Australian Brian Muir, the man who bought from Ford one of the Cobras Daytona Coupe no longer raced. With a special plane he's flown over to La Sarthe, to discover the Ford MkIIA he never drove.
The rest of Ford's entry are five GT40s, all Group 4, not the ultra-light P40s of Alan Mann seen at the April tests. Two of them are entered by Essex Wire for a British, American, Belgian and German racer. Colonel Hoare who is at the same time Ford and Ferrari distributor in the UK shows not only with Maranello Concessionaires Ferraris, but also with his pale blue GT40 for two F1 top-racers: Austria's Jochen Rindt and England Innes Ireland. Ford France has its GT40 for two French racers. Last but not least Peter Suttcliffe is present with his own private GT40, which he'll share with Switzerland's Dieter Spoerry. Of the 26 Ford drivers at the start only 9 are Americans.