Lister Le Mans History

When engineering entrepreneur Laurence Pearce acquired the dormant Lister name in 1986, he embarked on a programme of converting Jaguar XJS bodyshells into something far more formidable. By 1989 this had crystallised into the Lister Le Mans: a thoroughly re-engineered XJS with a bored-out 6.0-litre V12, Cosworth-supplied internals, additional fuel injectors, and a reworked engine management system producing around 482 bhp — enough to push the coupe beyond 200 mph, a figure that in 1989 was the preserve of outright supercars.

The most extreme Le Mans variant used a 7.0-litre twin-supercharged V12 producing over 600 bhp (period sources cite 604 bhp), transmitted via a Ferrari clutch and a five-speed manual gearbox to wide Goodyear tyres. Every car received its own chassis number and was designated a Lister-Jaguar rather than a simple conversion. A cabriolet joined the coupe for 1990. The Le Mans was priced from £121,000 at launch — roughly treble the standard XJS — and approximately 90 examples were built in total across the production run, making it a rare contemporary of the Ferrari F40.