Dino 206 S with a pair from NART and another for Maranello. Nino Vaccarella, race winner in 1964, was furious when he found out he was ‘demoted’ to drive the Dino rather than the P3 and threatened to walk out, but did, in the end run the car. Chevrolet was the other player in the over 2-litre class. Ex-Ferrari engineer Giotto Bizzarrini had fallen out with Renzo Rivolta and with his own company brought his new design, the P538, but still using the 5.3L Chevrolet engine. The other Chevy was in Texan Jim Hall's Chaparral 2D. The 5.3L small block put out 420 bhp and had a semi-automatic transmission. Driven by Phil Hill and Jo Bonnier, they made a big impact winning the Nürburgring round just two weeks earlier. Porsche came with a new model – the 906 designed by the team led by Ferdinand Piëch. With the 2.0L flat-6 engine from the 911, it had recently been homologated for Group 4 with the requisite 50 cars. It was race-proven too, after winning the Targa Florio the month before. However three "langheck" (long-tail) prototypes were also entered by the works team, driven by Hans Herrmann/Herbert Linge, Jo Siffert/Colin Davis and Udo Schütz/Peter de Klerk. Alfa Romeo, and its works team Autodelta, had withdrawn from racing for a year to prepare a new car for 1967. But this year, a significant new manufacturer entered the fray: Matra had bought out Automobiles René Bonnet in 1964, rebadging the Djet. However it was a new design that was entered. The M620 had a 2-litre version of the BRM Formula 1 engine developing 245 bhp that could match the Porsches in speed, making 275 kp/h (170 mph). The three cars were driven by up and coming young French single-seater drivers Jean-Pierre Beltoise/Johnny Servoz-Gavin, Jean-Pierre Jaussaud/Henri Pescarolo and Jo Schlesser with Welshman Alan Rees. Remarkably, given British dominance of the race barely a decade earlier, there were only three British cars in this year's race. Defending class-champions Austin-Healey had two works entries. The other was a Marcos Engineering kit-car based on a Mini Cooper 'S' chassis. Entered by Frenchman Hubert Giraud and driven by Jean-Louis Marnat and Claude Ballot-Lena, the team was able to get a works engine and gearbox from BMC. The spectators laughed at the small car and its apparent resemblance to a flea. But the Mini Marcos would become the 'darling of