Well, the
E-Type IS the most beautiful car ever. Enzo Ferrari himself claimed it as such, so it must be true.
The
D-Type was so successful in what we'd now call LMS or ALMS series racing that they literally changed the rules in 1958 to ban the glorious 3.8L XK-series engine in it. The XK engine doesn't really come alive until about 3.4L, so the car became uncompetitive after they imposed a 3L max displacement limit.
And yeah,
the D-type wasn't designed to be pretty. It was designed to kick Porsche, Ferrari, Auto Union, and Mercedes ass by using aerodynamic principles - which it did until it got crippled by the rules. The Jaguar curves were a bit of an afterthought. It is the descendant
E-Type that was designed to be both pretty and aerodynamic at the same time.
The fame of the D-Type was that it was designed and built by underfunded almost unknown men in a shed - and it went on to kick the ass of the richest, most supported, heavily backed automakers in the world. For three years in a row. Nobody has ever seen anything like it before or since.
Funny little facts - that D-Type right there, unless it's one of the Lynx replicas, is worth about TWO MILLION DOLLARS. Makes those Ferraris look like cheap trash, IMHO.
Another little fact - If the D-Type driver knows what he's doing, those 360s are in for a huge surprise. The D-Type made between 250 and 300hp, much of it down low, and they only weighed about 1900 lbs. The 360 weighs another 1100lbs again and doesn't have enough horsepower to make up the difference. D-Type: 0.157 hp/lb, 360: 0.133hp/lb. The D-Type looks like someone's fitted modern rubber to it, so it's going to be "interesting". Looks like a couple of stallions from Italy may be about to get gelded by a 50 year old cat. The 360s are going to have to be close before they enter the final straight, because that's the only place they're going to catch the D-Type if the D-Type driver is going all out.
Which, IMHO, puts the difference in performance between a REAL race car, even an old one, and street cars into stark perspective.
One minor thing - that may not be a D-Type, but an XK-SS. The XK-SS is basically a D-Type fitted with bumpers (optional) and other roadgoing equipment to make it street legal. It's hard to tell since the later D-Types were more or less custom and some of *them* had some of the XK-SS gear fitted. It looks to have the side windows of an XK-SS, but it does not seem to have the side exhausts of an XK-SS (some SS models didn't have them). It could also be a replica D-Type or XK-SS, which would also explain the mix of equipment.