Autosport Plus

The man behind Japan's only Le Mans winner

Toyota could finally break its Le Mans jinx next week, but it will come 27 years too late to be the first Japanese winner if it does. Nigel Stroud, the man who penned the iconic Mazda 787B, discusses the history-making machine

Engineering

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The screaming rotary-engined Mazda 787B, which remains the only Japanese car to win the Le Mans 24 Hours, is rightly regarded as one of the most iconic sportscars of all time, and unsurprisingly stands as designer Nigel Stroud's favourite creation. He has a 1:43-scale model of it by way of a memento in his house.

But that affinity is not simply because it beat the fancied Jaguars and Mercedes to score a shock victory in 1991. Rather, it's because it successfully applied the lessons learned in three previous iterations of Mazdaspeed's Le Mans programme dating back to '86.

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Author James Newbold

James Newbold is Autosport's Plus Editor, responsible for coordinating website feature content.

In a sign of things to come, having completed his Politics and International Relations degree at the University of East Anglia in 2015, he left his graduation ceremony early to catch the last train to Brussels for the following day's Spa 24 Hours.

After a period as a freelancer, he joined the Autosport staff in 2018 and won the Motorsport UK young journalist of the year award. He initially edited Autosport magazine's Performance and Engineering supplements before joining the website team in his current role in 2020.

A keen enthusiast of anything that can be categorised unusual or niche, he enjoys unearthing little-known stories across all branches of motorsport, but has spent most of his career covering sportscars and is a regular part of the Le Mans 24 Hours reporting team.

He lives with his wife and children in Plymouth, England.