[5] GTi Engineering was created by Richard Lloyd in 1977 as his personal team in the British Saloon Car Championship, in which he had been competing for several years.

[1] Following the 1980 campaign, GTi Engineering was approached by Porsche about becoming the primary European entrant of the company's new 924 Carrera GTR in endurance racing.

The team made their international debut at the 1981 1000 km Monza, where drivers Richard Lloyd and Tony Dron finished in eighth place and second in their class.

[6] Victory quickly followed as Lloyd and driver Andy Rouse won their class in their home event, the 1000 km Brands Hatch.

In the team's second race with the 956, their home event at Silverstone, Jan Lammers and Thierry Boutsen secured a podium finish, which was followed by another at the Nürburgring.

As part of an agreement with sponsor Canon, GTi Engineering entered a second car in select rounds of the championship for the purpose of carrying an on-board video camera within the cockpit to record the entire event.

[11] Although the added weight of the camera systems hampered the performance of the 956, the car was still driven as normal by Richard Lloyd and teammate, Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason, and it made its debut at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Jonathan Palmer substituted for Fitzpatrick and, along with Lammers, took the team's first World Championship victory at Brands Hatch, two laps ahead of a Joest Racing Porsche.

[10] During 1985, the team officially changed its title to Richard Lloyd Racing, although the GTi Engineering name was retained as part of the company.

The season began with Lammers and Palmer earning good results, and the team managed to earn a second-place finish at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with Jonathan Palmer, James Weaver, and Lloyd himself completing the race only three laps behind the winning Joest Porsche but ahead of the factory Rothmans Porsche.

[10] Canon chose to end their sponsorship of Richard Lloyd Racing in 1986, leaving the team to sign Liqui Moly as a replacement.

Their results improved, however, as Brands Hatch once again saw success for the squad when they earned their second World Championship victory by four laps over Joest Racing, with factory Porsche drivers Mauro Baldi and Bob Wollek in the car.

Outside of the World Championship, the 956 GTi also made an appearance at an Interserie event at Richard Lloyd Racing's home track of Thruxton, winning one heat and finishing second overall in the combined results.

A fourth-place finish at the opening sprint event was followed by a string of accidents and disqualifications, leading to the team missing several races for repairs.

[21] An evolution of the World Championship in 1989, with a schedule consisting entirely of shorter sprint events, helped reduce the cost for the teams and allowed Richard Lloyd Racing to restructure and add a second car to their line-up.

A sixth place at Spa and third at a shortened Montreal event were the highlights of the year, and Richard Lloyd Racing was once again ninth in the championship with three points.

[2] Following a successful debut season with the 956 in 1983, Richard Lloyd commissioned designer Nigel Stroud to develop a replacement monocoque and base chassis for the team's car in an attempt to increase structural rigidity over that of the factory Porsche unit.

[3] Further modifications were made to the car once the monocoque had been completed, which included replacing the entire Porsche front suspension setup with a custom pullrod design.

[2] In addition, the standard rear wing was replaced with a twin element design at different angles of attack, with a narrow gap between the two.

The central gap on the bottom of the nose was filled in, allowing for the relocation of the brake cooling ducts towards the center of the car, while an extended splitter was added to aid front downforce.