Alan Mann began his motorsport career as a part-time racing driver and entrant in British saloon car races in 1962, running Ford Zephyrs and Anglias under the Andrews Garage banner. The following year he prepared a Ford Cortina GT under the Alan Andrews Racing name for driver Henry Taylor, competing in both racing and rallying in what amounted to a quasi-official Ford programme. A notable early result came at the 1963 Marlboro 12 Hours in the United States, where Taylor and co-driver Jimmy Blumer finished second in class in a Cortina GT, an outcome that caught the attention of John Holman of Holman and Moody, Ford's leading American racing operation. That impression, combined with Mann's growing reputation, opened the door to a full factory relationship for 1964.
From 1964, Alan Mann Racing operated as an official Ford factory team. The breadth of its programme was unusual: in a single season the team could contest the Monte Carlo Rally, the Tour de France Automobile, British saloon car events, and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Ford entrusted the team with some of the most important machinery of the era, including the GT40, Ford Cortina, Ford Falcon, and Ford Escort.
Mann drew elite driving talent throughout the team's existence. Graham Hill, Jackie Stewart, John Whitmore, and Frank Gardner were among those who raced under the red and gold banner at various points during the team's five-year factory tenure.
Alan Mann Racing played a significant role in Ford's campaign to win Le Mans. For the 1966 effort, the team developed a lightweight variant of the GT40, featuring an alloy body and other weight-saving modifications. Ford ordered five such cars but only two were completed before the project was cancelled in favour of the heavier but more powerful MKII GT40. At the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans, Alan Mann Racing entered two seven-litre MKII cars. One of them ran at the front in the early stages of the race before both cars retired. Beyond the GT40, the team also built and raced the Ford F3L prototype, a purpose-designed endurance racing car intended to revive Ford's Le Mans challenge in the late 1960s.
The team accumulated a strong record of outright and class victories across multiple disciplines during its active years:
1964 Tour de France Automobile, Touring Division: Peter Procter and Andrew Cowan won in a Ford Mustang entered by Alan Mann Racing.
1965 International Championship for GT Manufacturers, Over 2000cc Division: Won by Shelby using cars entered by several teams including Alan Mann Racing.
1965 European Touring Car Challenge: John Whitmore won driving a Ford Cortina Lotus entered by the team.
1967 British Saloon Car Championship: Frank Gardner took the title in a Ford Falcon Sprint entered by Alan Mann Racing.
1968 British Saloon Car Championship: Gardner won again, this time in a Ford Cortina Lotus and Ford Escort Twin Cam.
Beyond racing, Alan Mann Racing became a notable supplier of specialist vehicles to the British film and television industries. The team built the original Chitty Chitty Bang Bang cars for the 1968 film of the same name. It also contributed work to the James Bond film Goldfinger, to the cancelled Steve McQueen Formula 1 film Day of the Champion, and to pre-production work for McQueen's later production Le Mans. The team constructed three futuristic-looking cars based on Ford Zephyr running gear with aluminium gullwing bodywork for Gerry Anderson's 1969 film Doppelgänger; those cars were later repainted and appeared in the UFO television series of 1970. The vehicles were reportedly unfinished and unreliable in service.
The original Alan Mann Racing team ceased operations in 1969 following the winding down of Ford's European factory effort. The team was revived by Alan Mann himself in 2004 and returned to competition in historic racing, appearing regularly at high-profile events including the Silverstone Classic, the Goodwood Festival of Speed, the Goodwood Revival, and the Masters Historic Pre-1966 Touring Cars series. The red and gold livery, synonymous with the team's 1960s heyday, has continued to appear at these events as a reminder of one of Britain's most versatile and successful factory-backed racing organisations of that decade.