Eric Broadley began Lola with small front-engined sports cars before expanding into Formula Junior, Formula Three, Formula Two, and Formula One machinery. One pivotal early design was the Lola Mk.6 coupe with a Ford V8 engine, which attracted Ford's attention and led Broadley to set aside Lola for two years to collaborate with Roy Lunn on what became the Ford GT40. After releasing himself from that contract, Broadley returned to his own cars and developed the Lola T70, a sports-prototype that competed in the World Championship for Makes and the Can-Am series through the late 1960s and into the 1970s.
Lola's first involvement with Formula One came in 1962, supplying Lola Mk4 cars to the Bowmaker-Yeoman Racing Team for John Surtees and Roy Salvadori. Surtees claimed pole position in the car's first World Championship race, though no outright victories in championship events followed. In 1967, Lola assisted Honda Racing by providing a 1966 Indianapolis monocoque as the basis for a new F1 car; the resulting Honda RA300 — informally dubbed the "Hondola" — won the 1967 Italian Grand Prix.
Graham Hill's Embassy Hill team commissioned cars from Lola from 1974, leading to the T370 and its successor designs. The Haas Lola programme of 1985–86, funded by Beatrice Foods and run by Teddy Mayer, featured Alan Jones and Patrick Tambay as drivers and promised works Ford turbocharged power that arrived too late to be competitive; the project folded after 1986. The Larrousse and Calmels team raced Lola-based cars from 1987, scoring useful results with Lamborghini V12 power in 1989–90, though a controversy in 1990 over the cars' registered constructor identity cost the team its championship points. Scuderia Italia raced Lola cars in 1993 with customer Ferrari engines to little effect.
Lola's only direct works entry came in 1997, underwritten by MasterCard. The cars arrived in Australia for the season-opening race having never run in a wind tunnel; they were uncompetitive from the outset and the programme collapsed after a single race when the sponsors withdrew. The financial fallout pushed Lola Cars into receivership before Martin Birrane stepped in with a rescue package.
After its early F1 activity, Lola concentrated on sports cars and Formula Two, where the company served as the works team for BMW. When Formula Two gave way to Formula 3000 in 1985, Lola initially adapted its Indycar chassis before fielding a bespoke F3000 design from 1986. The company competed with Ralt and Reynard for several years before Reynard's market dominance pushed Lola to the margins. In 1996, Lola won the contract from the FIA to supply all chassis for the International Formula 3000 Championship as a one-make series; contracts were renewed in 1999 (Lola B99/50) and 2002 (Lola B02/50) before GP2 replaced F3000 in 2005 and Lola lost the chassis contract. Lola also won the contract for Formula Nippon in 2003 and supplied all 50 cars for the inaugural A1 Grand Prix series in 2005.
Graham Hill won the 1966 Indianapolis 500 in a Lola chassis. After a sustained campaign in Formula 5000 and a revived Can-Am using F5000-based cars — winning five consecutive Can-Am championships — Lola entered full-time CART competition from 1983 with Mario Andretti driving for Newman/Haas Racing. The marque won the 1990 Indianapolis 500 with Arie Luyendyk and established itself as the dominant Indycar supplier of the early 1990s before Reynard's arrival in 1994 eroded that position. Following Reynard's financial collapse, Lola re-established itself as the primary CART/Champ Car chassis supplier from 2003 until the series adopted a spec Panoz chassis for 2007.
Lola introduced the T600/T610 range for IMSA GTP competition in the early 1980s, carrying Cosworth, Mazda, and Chevrolet engines. Derivatives competed in IMSA and Group C racing through the decade. From 1998, Lola produced a series of Le Mans-class sports cars, winning LMP2 class honours at Le Mans in 2005 and 2006 with Ray Mallock Limited using the B05/40, and achieving multiple class wins in the American Le Mans Series.
Lola entered financial administration in May 2012 and ceased trading that October after no buyer could be found. Assets were acquired by Multimatic Inc. and The Carl A. Haas Automotive company. In 2022, Till Bechtolsheimer purchased the brand and trademarks, intellectual property, and the Lola Technical Centre with its wind tunnel. Lola returned to professional competition in the 2024–25 Formula E World Championship as a powertrain supplier in partnership with Yamaha, with the Lola Yamaha Abt team scoring a podium finish at the Miami ePrix in just its fifth race.
Lola cars initially carried Mark (Mk) designations, shifting to Type (T) from 1964. From 1986, the first two digits after T indicated the design year, the final digits the car type: for example, /00 for American open-wheel, /10 for Group C and LMP1, /50 for Formula 3000. From 1998 the T prefix was replaced by B in honour of owner Martin Birrane.
Lola's sustained presence across six decades of motorsport, its five consecutive Can-Am championships, its Indianapolis 500 victories under Hill and Luyendyk, and its Formula E return make it one of the most durable racing car marques in history. Patrick Head, later chief designer at Williams, designed some of his earliest cars at Lola. The company's willingness to operate simultaneously in sports cars, single-seaters, and spec series across multiple continents distinguished it from more specialized constructors.