JJO 931W

This number was only used once by the factory, it was put on Tony Ponds car for the 1980 RAC rally, the last appearance for the works TRs. It's a well-known story that the number was taken from a development TR8 and put on Tony's favourite car TUD 683T after John Davenport had seen four brand new Escorts in the Ford works team. The car finished 7th overall after dropping down 100 places due to an accident with one of the lion's feeding tables at Longleat. This is the most successful of the factory TR7s, it won two rallies in 1980 as well as being the highest placed TR on the RAC. In 1998 JJO won the Coys Rallysprint in the hands of Tony Pond, his time for the course was only 2 seconds slower than the latest works Escort Cosworth WRC.