1963 ½ FALCON V-8 SPRINT, 427/425 Fastback Galaxie hardtop and Holman & Moody rally Falcon racecars break cover in Monte Carlo!
Introduction of the Falcon V-8 Sprint and three rally Falcons was incorporated into Ford Division’s 1963 ½ Monaco Press Preview that I attended. At the time, I was editor of CUSTOM RODDER and CAR, Speed & Style magazines. One of the highlights of the program for me was driving a 1963 ½ FALCON V-8 SPRINT in the Ford International Press Road Rallye (Team 21).
In addition to the 427/425 Galaxie, I also drove a Falcon Sprint on a 53-mile section of the official Monte Carlo Rallye route. It was powered by a 260 cubic-inch V-8 and fitted with a four-speed B-W T-10 transmission and 3.50 rear gears. Even though it had drum brakes, I found the Sprint to outperform disc-braked British Ford Zodiacs and Zephyrs that I sampled. A Ford Zephyr had won the Monte Carlo Rally ten years earlier! The drive took us on tight, paved, and unpaved two-lane roads and 180-degree switchbacks in the Maritime Alps (Italy and France).
My #21 teammate and navigator, below, was Jim Steinfirst, then Senior Editor of Automotive International and the first President of the International Motor Press Association (IMPA). When we came back to Monte Carlo, we found a paved lot, ideal for running “stopwatch” 0-60 mph sprints. Without the benefit of a limited-slip differential, the best we could manage was mid-to-high nines, dipping into the tens. Not too impressive after driving a 425-horsepower 427 Galaxie!
In January 1963, Ford entered three V-8 Falcons, built by Holman & Moody, in this ultra-high-profile, grueling, endurance competition. Participation in the Rallye was timed to the introduction of the V-8-engined ’63 ½ Falcon Sprint; revealed to select international automotive media in Monte Carlo the first week of January.
Holman & Moody, Ford’s contract race shop, built the three Monte Carlo Falcons, since they already had experience preparing V-8-engined Falcon Challengers for endurance road racing in 1962. They knew how to build bulletproof 260 V-8 engines and powertrains that could survive more than 2,000 miles of severe use. When I tried to find out engine horsepower ratings from team mechanics, numbers ranged from 240 to “over 300”, depending on whom I asked. What I did know was that they sounded more like 300, than 240 horsepower!
However, Ford Falcons did not win the 1963 Monte Carlo Rally. Jopp & Jarman finished 35th overall, but won Class 8 (cars with engines over 3,000 cc) in #221, while Ljungfeldt & Haggbom in Falcon #223 finished 43rd overall, second in Class 8, and set an incredible record that established Ford as a serious contender. For the first time in the event’s history, one driver, Bo Ljungfeldt, below, a road racer with little rally driving experience, posted the fastest times on all six special speed stages of the rally. Anne Hall and Margaret McKenzie did not finish in their Falcon due to a technicality.
Kenneth Rudeen summed up Ford’s first serious Monte effort best in his February 4, 1963, Sports Illustrated article, The Awful Auto Ride. “The new kings of the mountains, in fact, are the Ford Falcon Sprint and a sort of superman named Bo Ljungfeldt. Le Grand Bo, as 40-year-old Bo Tage Georg Ljungfeldt came to be known, stormed through the mountains with such ferocious zeal that he would have won the rally outright but for penalties received elsewhere on the journey.”
Unfortunately, I did not get an opportunity to either drive or ride in one of the competition Falcons in Monte Carlo. But two months later, thanks to Peter Jopp and Ford’s Tom Tierney, I was tossing the Jopp & Jarman Falcon around at Ford’s Dearborn Proving Ground. After Peter Jopp showed me the line around the road course, still capped with spots of snow and ice, I made a few laps plus a couple of runs on the high-speed section of the track. Because of weather conditions, the posted top speed was 105 mph, and that’s as fast as I drove. Considering the engine’s 6,500 rpm redline and 4.11 Posi gears in the Falcon’s narrowed nine-inch Galaxie rear, I wasn’t sure how much faster I could have gone without over-revving the small-block.
Other than outward appearance, a production 1963 ½ FALCON V-8 SPRINT powered by the 164 horsepower, four-barrel 260-inch small-block, above, bore little resemblance to the Monte Carlo Falcons built by Holman & Moody. They were enduro racecars! However, the Falcon Sprint was a good-looking, entry-level mini-musclecar that delivered solid performance and the opportunity for bolt-on performance upgrades. Its DNA can be found in the first Mustang introduced a year later!
Everything you’ve always wanted to know about the 1963 ½ FALCON V-8 SPRINT can be found at Over-Drive Magazine @ https://over-drive-magazine.com/2026/03/30/1963-ford-falcon-fact-sheet/
The 1963 1/2 FALCON V-8 SPRINT and Holman & Moody Monte Carlo Rallye Falcons are covered in https://www.amazon.com/Ford-Total-Performance-Legendary-High-Performance/dp/0760348588/