.
The Ferrari cult might have achieved its climax in the late 1980s after the passing of its founder when the
classic Ferrari market and the limited production cars like the F40 realized astronomic prices on the action
market and even after the market normalized the cars of the Enzo era are still on top of every annual results
list. The coach built small series of the 1950s and the legendary 250 GT series rate among the most sought
after classics and are regular entrants in every Concours d´Elegance in the world. And although Enzo himself
was only interested in the racing results and saw the production of road cars as a necessity rather that a
priority people admire the cars on static display as well as on the race track. Following the tradition of the
50th and 60th anniversary this year again a concours should be the heart of the festivities for the round jubilee
of the marque.
After several events all over the world the cars finally made it home to their place of birth for the intended
highlight of the Ferrari season. Starting last week in several cities in Europe a convoy of about 500 mostly
modern cars were on the road to Maranello to join their older brothers for a line-up in Fiorano, the test track of
the Scuderia near the factory. About 120 cars were entered in the main event, the concours and after having
registered at the Museo a small tour was organized to Enzo’s birthplace in Modena were the cars passed the
Casa Enzo Ferrari to be displayed to the public at the Piazza Roma in front of the military academy. As
Ferrari is a national pride and passion rather than just a car the public was welcomed to see about half of the
cars in the old town of Modena before they were put behind closed doors at Fiorano for the selected guests to
join the celebrations. After the parade at low speed though the masses and a lunch inside the academy the
cars were set up at Fiorano and the judging by the international jury began early as the weather forecast for
the following day was very bad. After heavy showers on Thursday on the way down to Maranello one could
imagine what the weather might be and nobody intended to keep the cars and drivers in these conditions
during the judging progress.
At the same time as the judges led by Adolfo Orsi including Ferrari authorities from all over the world looked
at the cars the Canadian auction house RM Sotheby´s set up the official auction of the event with the third
Leggenda e Passione after 2007 and 2009. Announced as the most important single marque auction RM
Sotheby´s had the challenge to set up an auction within a very short time span after the Monterey sale and
just after the London auction a few days before.
With a wide selection of classics and several modern Ferraris achieving record prices including an
outstanding 8.3 million Euros (for charity) for the very last LaFerrari Aperta yet to be produced the auction did
not disappoint at all. After a quick buffet lunch and a look around over the cars when the sun set the rain set
in in time for the very colorful and artistic show taking the spectators through the history both of the road and
racing cars. Beside the current F1 drivers Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen the former Ferrari works
drivers Jean Alesi and Niki Lauda were seen alongside the F1 team boss Arrivabene to represent the Scuderia
after being introduced by Sergio Marchionne.
The emotional highlight of the evening might have been the film on the latest Ferrari successes when the
cheers of the crowd showed that Michael Schumacher is still the most popular of them.
The evening was finalized with a concert by Jamiroquai whose front man Jay Kay is known to be a big fan of
the prancing horse as seen by his green LaFerrari on display in Modena.
After the last guests were brought back to the hotels by shuttle for a short sleep the concours started as
intended early in the morning. With most of the cars already judged both the owners and the judges had a
rather relaxed morning that should be cloudy but remarkable dry for what was expected. The 118 cars were
lined up in 20 different classes including all the key models of the decades including the early 12-cylinder
both in GT and race trim as well as the short 4-cylinder era with the 750 Monza and 500 Mondial/TR/TRC.
Most prominent was certainly the 250 with no less than 6 California Spyder on show in the open class as well
as the SWB and LWB versions of the Berlinetta including on of the rare Interims and the legendary 250 GTO.
Other classes shown the 275 series, the 330 and 365 Daytona, the boxer era with the 365/512 and the
supercars of the 288 GTO, F40, F50 and Enzo eras. One of the highlights was again the latest Ferrari
Classiche restoration, the 412P of Harry Yaeggi that was shown a few weeks earlier in Pebble Beach where it
lost the “clash of the titans” in the Ferrari Competition class against the Paul Russell restored 335S.
Look back at Pebble and at the Chantilly Concours held at the same weekend in France one was also aware
what was missing at Maranello this weekend. Very few of the American major collectors were present at
Maranello and none of the major restorers like Russell, Carte, Dennison or someone of MPI was seen as they
obviously were intended to be too biased to be there as judge and as many of their clients were showing in
France their absence was obvious.
Comparing the entry list of the concours with the one in Chantilly “only” one GTO was there and not a single
250 TR, the time of the dominant MM and Le Mans cars was basically only represented by the MM winning
340 MM and the Carrera Panamericana livered 375 MM.
On the other hand the display included several interesting Superamerica models as well as two examples
from the former Agnelli ownership. Probably the most elegant Ferrari of all time is certainly the two-tone
Gianni Agnelli 166 MM, the most unique maybe the Testarossa Spyder that should win the best of show GT
award later that day.
Harry Yaeggi might be the tragic hero of this summer. Selfmade man Yaeggi fulfilled his dream of owning this
car he sat in earlier in his live some 13 years ago before having it restored by Ferrari Classiche just recently.
Intended to be a major winner at Pebble it had to give way as mentioned earlier and although the Maranello
concours was set up on to playground of the Classiche department the yellow 412P once again had to settle
with another third in class behind a F40 Competition and a 333SP.
At 2pm the class awards were presented on the huge stage by Simon Kidston. Finally the two BoS were
awarded with the mentioned Testarossa Spyder and the 340 MM in its MM winning livery.
After two very interesting days the hundreds of Ferrari coming from all over Europe set off to make their way
home resulting at same very expensive traffic jams outside the gates. Talking to some of the owners this was
a typical Italian event with many questions upfront regarding the timing and organization but even without the
perfection in the organization it once again worked out at the end giving this corporate event also a rather
familiar and informal touch we all love from events like the Mille Miglia.
We have put together a preview gallery with 150 images, a more detailed gallery of all the cars at the
concours will follow the next days
Images ... Peter Singhof
www.ClassicCarPhotography.de
|
