Just imagine the excitement now. Fresh from a Le Mans victory, breaking a decade of Porsche dominance, Jaguar declares that a road-going version of its Le Mans-winning car will be built. You'd expect collectors and enthusiasts to be queuing around the block, chequebook in hand - especially with the kicker of a V12 engine.
That issue still seems bizarre. After all, you got a Peter Stevens design, a staggering V12, motorsport pedigree, manual gearbox, a central driving position, lightweight construction… the Jaguar sounds a lot like the McLaren F1 that came a couple of years later. And where that car was considered low volume with 64 road cars made , there were just 51 XJR-15s ever.
They certainly seem pretty hard work as well though, even by the standards of early ‘90s supercars , and that will have put some off. Factor in the 1992 recession, Jaguar’s own XJ220 with more power and then the glut of supercars that followed in the mid-1990s - EB110, F50, F1 - and perhaps it becomes easier to see why there weren’t more XJR-15s.
The Jag was in East Asia for almost a quarter of a century, before being repatriated via an RM auction in 2014. It’s been in the UK ever since, with a change of ownership in 2017 and an extensive recommissioning at Forest Custom and Classics soon after. Which is not going to be a small job for a car this exotic. When the work involves replacing a fuel bladder you know it’s not an average recommission.