Austin Mini Cooper MkII vs Ford Escort 1300 GT: some like it warm

By Charlie Calderwood

| 18 Sep 2026

Classic & Sports Car – Austin Mini Cooper MkII vs Ford Escort 1300 GT

There was a brief, glorious moment in the late 1960s when the British high street could be mistaken for the service park clearing ahead of a rally special stage.

To the left, the shrill gear whine of a Mini Cooper; to the right, the crisp, syncopated bark of a Ford Kent ‘four’ warming through a downdraught Weber.

Shelby Mustangs, Mitsubishi Evos, or indeed RS Fords and the Mini Cooper ‘S’ might be blue-collar hero cars that humbled far more expensive machinery across the decades, but they were out of the reach of most nonetheless.

And that’s as true today as it was when they were new.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT’s sporty pinstriping

The two cars together here, however, a 1968 Austin Mini Cooper MkII and a 1970 Ford Escort 1300 GT, are what the average enthusiast actually bought for cheap thrills.

It was the 1300 GT and Cooper that got overconfident young drivers into dubious situations, gave amateur club racers their first taste of motorsport and offered the beleaguered suburbanite some relief from monotony.

Not the heroes we dreamed of, perhaps, but the ones we could actually have.

The GT and the Cooper followed similar recipes: both took the largest engines from the standard line-up, tuned them for more fizz and added the necessary trim to make them look as fast as their owners wished they would go.

The Austin Mini Cooper MkII is peerlessly agile and engaging

Mini did it first, although the British Motor Corporation worked out how to make a cheaper Cooper iteratively rather than instinctively.

When it first arrived in the MkI Mini range in 1961, the Cooper used a unique engine, the long-stroke 997cc A-series, which was tuned to 55bhp with twin carburettors.

By the 1967 MkII Mini, however, BMC had become more rational. The Cooper now borrowed the much better, squarer-dimensioned 998cc A-series developed for the luxury-spec Wolseley Hornet and Riley Elf twins.

With a hotter cam and twin carbs, output was similar to the old 997 unit, but it came at slightly lower revs and from a sweeter-revving, cheaper-to-produce engine.

The Mini Cooper MkII’s 998cc A-series engine sports twin SU carburettors

Retaining the MkI additions of front disc brakes and a slightly upgraded interior, BMC could now offer the Cooper at just 23% above a base Mini.

Slightly cheaper, even, than the basic Austin 1100, meaning you could buy a Mini Cooper and come home to your spouse without shame, for you hadn’t even passed up a more practical car.

Meanwhile, the Cooper ‘S’, with its highly strung 1275cc unit, wasn’t far from double the price of an entry-level model, costing the same as an A60 Countryman.

The MkII Mini Cooper’s discreet bonnet badge

The story was similar over in Halewood. As ever, Ford let others jump first so it could be second or third to market with a better-planned product, and the new Escort, launched in 1967, came with a full range of trim levels from the off.

Mirroring the Cooper ‘S’ with its halo appeal, a bespoke engine, upcoming rally success and a price-tag nearly twice that of the base model, was the Twin Cam.

It was even built in a different factory from the normal Escort, as were the RS models that replaced it after a couple of years.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT (closest) and Austin Mini Cooper MkII gave ’60s drivers attainable performance

Among mainstream Escorts however, the 1300 GT was top of the pile, but, reflecting the Cooper, it cost only about a quarter more than a basic model.

Although considerably more expensive than the Mini, it was a bigger car with a larger engine, and the price difference was lessened by the fact that Ford included various extras within the price that BMC didn’t.

Astoundingly, Autocar remarked on Ford’s generosity in including not just delivery fees, but even antifreeze in the purchase price.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT has a twin-choke Weber on its 1297cc ‘four’

The GT took the optional 1298cc engine from the Escort Super and added a hotter cam just like the Cooper, while its carburettor was upgraded to a twin-choke Weber and it gained a four-branch manifold.

That resulted in 64bhp at first, although by the time ‘our’ 1970 GT was built, and the crossflow engine had been revised to metric measurements, it was rated at 72bhp.

From the start it came with a six-dial dashboard binnacle, unique to the GT and Twin Cam until others such as the Sport and 1300E joined the range in the early ’70s, although after just a year on sale with silver-finish dash inserts it switched to mock wood, as on this car.

Wider, 4½in steel rims, front disc brakes and radial tyres that were options on other Escorts were standard, too.

The Escort 1300 GT was Ford of Britain’s first car with rack-and-pinion steering

To step into the Ford is to find the checklist of the late-’60s idea of a sporting car ticked comprehensively.

Lots of dials, chrome strips and the odd flash of bright wood, with black everywhere else.

We’re used to dark interiors as the default today, but this would have looked like a serious, purposeful cockpit in 1970.

Perforated vinyl seats offer slight relief from the material’s body-gripping effect on a hot day, but it’s still a sticky place to be when it’s sunny.

The only non-original thing on this car is the steering wheel: it isn’t dished like the standard item, which means your knuckles catch on the dash top in wheel-twirling manoeuvres.

This Ford Escort 1300 GT is left-hand drive, so the speedo is in kph

Ford wouldn’t have let such an ergonomic compromise slip through: everything here is easy to use.

The gearlever is slick to engage yet avoids being vague, the pedals are well laid out and intuitive in operation, and the steering, even with the smaller wheel, isn’t overly heavy.

There’s a sense that Blue Oval management wouldn’t tolerate the kind of inconvenience that might put someone off in the 20-minute test drive during which a purchasing decision is made – and that mattered whether it was a sporting model or a grocery-getter.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT rolls in corners and pushes into understeer, but a lift brings it back

Starting up the Ford Escort’s crossflow engine awakens that familiar blobby idle, interspersed by thrashy roars of valvetrain as the throttle is prodded. Few motors sound less exotic than this.

Gearing is suitably short, so you’re in third just a few seconds after setting off, which helps to add a sense of speed to the ultimately modest acceleration.

Still, the GT would keep pace with a modern cheap hatchback today, while a typical late-’60s family car would feel glacial.

Mind you, the noisy engine, direct steering and evocative view over the bonnet, with its shoulders over the headlights, give the little car a sense of drama you won’t find in a Kia Picanto.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT shared its rectangular headlights with the 1300E

Climbing into a Mini is always a sensory re-education: you don’t so much sit in it as crouch over it.

The steering wheel is at an angle that suggests a municipal bus, yet there is an undeniable genius to this austerity.

The MkII brought a wider rear window and that slightly squared-off grille, but inside it remained beautifully, starkly functional.

There is the single central speedometer pod, flanked by cavernous door pockets that were famously dimensioned to hold a bottle of Gordon’s Gin.

The Mini Cooper MkII’s odd steering-wheel angle is overshadowed by its game-changing compact austerity

The A-series is hardly the engine of a thoroughbred, either: it starts with immediacy, and rattles course through the car in reaction.

It’s slightly less raucous in its sound, and the exhaust has a bit more parp to it than the Escort, but as soon as you set off that distinctive gear whine cuts in.

The Austin races through its gears, too, but the ’box is slightly harder to negotiate: certain movements are a bit stiff and slow to select until both transmission and driver are warmed up.

Nonetheless, the Mini feels more responsive thanks to a zingy throttle that bounces the car forward if it isn’t treated with care in the lower gears.

The Mini Cooper MkII transmits every byte of road data to its driver

As ever, the Cooper remains an addictive, visceral experience. Even with the slightly softer Hydrolastic suspension of a MkII, the busy, almost hyperactive ride telegraphs every stone and Tarmac repair directly to your coccyx.

But point it at a roundabout and all is forgiven: the steering is so telepathic, so utterly devoid of slack, that you merely think your way through a corner.

It grips with tenacity, and when you do go too fast it simply washes out into understeer – although lift-off oversteer is easily provoked.

It feels twice as quick as it is actually travelling – which is lucky, because at 70mph the cabin noise suggests you are re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere.

The Mini’s three-dial binnacle had first appeared in early Coopers, but became the norm in MkIIs

In comparison, the Escort feels much more the ‘proper’ car.

The ride is far better despite those old-fashioned leaf springs at the back, and the experience is more refined throughout.

A higher centre of gravity gives it extra body roll in the corners, and it loses out to the Mini in terms of ultimate grip. But it’s such a friendly and adjustable experience.

The Mk1 Ford Escort is the benchmark, small, rear-wheel-drive saloon for good reason.

The Ford Escort 1300 GT’s chequered-flag badge hints at the model’s pedigree

As a basic package for having fun and experimenting with handling fundamentals, this feels like ground zero.

Where the Mini darts, the Escort flows. If you enter a corner a fraction too quickly, the nose pushes wide in gentle understeer. Lift off the throttle and the weight shifts, bringing the front back in.

Get hard on the power on a damp surface and the tail will step out in a beautifully progressive, easily catchable slide.

Thanks to the four-branch exhaust manifold and twin-choke carb, the Escort’s engine note hardens above 3500rpm into a glorious, metallic, induction-heavy bark that bounces off roadside walls: it may be the more prosaic engine at rest, but it takes the gong at high revs.

The Ford Escort MkI taught a generation about chassis dynamics

When you drop back down to a cruise, however, you realise why the Escort won the hearts of the British public over the radical Mini.

The GT got stiffer suspension and wider wheels than the standard 1100, so the ride is fairly firm, but it possesses a leggy, grown-up compliance that the Mini simply cannot match.

It was in Autocar’s 1967 multi-page exposé on the new Escort that Ford introduced journalists to the now common acronym ‘NVH’ (noise, vibration, harshness).

Alec Issigonis would surely have laughed off the idea as decadent.

‘These cars got the over-confident into dubious situations and offered the beleaguered suburbanite relief from monotony’

Loud enough to be evocative but sufficiently quiet that you can still hold a conversation, the Escort feels the more balanced car.

It is small enough to thread through tight city streets, but spacious enough that you could drive it across the country with a boot full of luggage.

The Mini, meanwhile, is an uncompromising monument to both driving and engineering purity.

It demands your attention, rattles your skeleton and rewards you with an experience that modern hot hatches can only dream of mimicking.

It is a car for a Sunday-morning blast when you want to feel completely, breathlessly alive.

I can’t choose between them – but perhaps I don’t have to, because nowadays you can pick up both for the price of either a Cooper ‘S’ or a Twin Cam, and I know for sure I’d have more fun with the pair in my garage than with either one of those halo cars.

Images: Max Edleston

Thanks to: Bruno Pinho; Miguel Alberto

Factfiles

Austin Mini Cooper MkII

Sold/number built 1967-’69/21,627
Construction steel monocoque
Engine all-iron, ohv 998cc ‘four’, twin SU carburettors
Max power 55bhp @ 5250rpm
Max torque 52lb ft @ 2700rpm
Transmission four-speed manual, FWD
Suspension independent, at front by transverse links rear trailing arms; interlinked hydrolastic displacers f/r
Steering rack and pinion
Brakes discs front, drums rear
Length 10ft ¼in (3054mm)
Width 4ft 7½in (1410mm)
Height 4ft 5in (1346mm)
Wheelbase 6ft 8in (2036mm)
Weight 1400lb (636kg)
0-60mph 15 secs
Top speed 75mph
Mpg 30-40
Price new £708 (1968)
Price now £12-35,000*

Ford Escort 1300 GT

Sold/number built 1967-’71/2m (all)
Construction steel monocoque
Engine all-iron, ohv 1298cc ‘four’, twin-choke Weber carburettor
Max power 71bhp @ 6000rpm
Max torque 70lb ft @ 4300rpm
Transmission four-speed manual, RWD
Suspension: front independent, by MacPherson struts, anti-roll bar rear live axle, semi-elliptic leaf springs, telescopic dampers
Steering rack and pinion
Brakes discs front, drums rear, with servo
Length 13ft (3980mm)
Width 5ft 2in (1570mm)
Height 4ft 5in (1340mm)
Wheelbase 7ft 10in (2400mm)
Weight 1716lb (788kg)
0-60mph 12.6 secs
Top speed 99mph
Mpg 28-35
Price new £852 (1968)
Price now £9-25,000*