Editing Sports car racing (section)

===Post-war revival===
[[File:Jaguar XKD 606 1956.jpg|thumb|The [[1957 24 Hours of Le Mans]] was won in a [[Jaguar XKD]].]]
After the [[Second World War]], sports car racing emerged as a distinct form of racing with its own classic races, and, from 1953, its own [[Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile|FIA]] sanctioned [[World Sportscar Championship]]. In the 1950s, sports car racing was regarded as almost as important as Grand Prix competition, with major marques like [[Ferrari]], [[Maserati]], [[Jaguar (car)|Jaguar]] and [[Aston Martin]] investing much effort in their works programmes and supplying cars to customers; sports racers lost their close relationship to road-going sports cars in the 1950s and the major races were contested by dedicated competition cars such as the Jaguar C and D types, the Mercedes 300SLR, Maserati 300S, Aston Martin DBR1 and assorted Ferraris including the first Testa Rossas. Top Grand Prix drivers also competed regularly in sports car racing. After major accidents at the [[1955 24 Hours of Le Mans]] and the [[1957 Mille Miglia]] the power of sports cars was curbed with a 3-litre engine capacity limit applied to them in the World Championship from 1958. From 1962 sports cars temporarily took a back seat to GT cars with the FIA replacing the World Championship for Sports Cars with the International Championship for GT Manufacturers.<ref>Denis Jenkinson, Automobile Year Book of Sports Car Racing, 1982</ref>