This is an accepted version of this page
123-408: Nordic Challenge Cup (NCC) was the predecessor of the popular and long-running sports car racing series Interserie , which is known as the "European Can-Am " and still exists today. NCC consisted of only three races in 1969 and was replaced by Interserie in 1970. It is now mostly remembered for the large number of Formula One drivers competing in it. Among these drivers were Jochen Rindt , who won
246-451: A V12 engine placed in the front of the car , and it presaged Ferrari's full embrace of mid-engine architecture, as well as V6 and V8 engines, in the 1970s and 1980s. Enzo Ferrari died in 1988, an event that saw Fiat expand its stake to 90%. The last car that he personally approved—the F40 —expanded on the flagship supercar approach first tried by the 288 GTO four years earlier. Enzo
369-469: A World Championship Grand Prix with a Ferrari car. Ferrari supplied cars complete with V8 engines for the A1 Grand Prix series, from the 2008–2009 season. The car was designed by Rory Byrne and is styled to resemble the 2004 Ferrari Formula one car. Ferrari currently runs a customer GT program for a racing version of its 458 and has done so for the 458's predecessors, dating back to the 355 in
492-615: A back seat to GT cars with the FIA replacing the World Championship for Sports Cars with the International Championship for GT Manufacturers. In national rather than international racing, sports car competition in the 1950s and early 1960s tended to reflect what was locally popular, with the cars that were successful locally often influencing each nation's approach to competing on the international stage. In
615-501: A brand image built around racing heritage, luxury, and exclusivity. As of May 2023, Ferrari is also one of the largest car manufacturers by market capitalisation , with a value of approximately US$ 85.5 billion. Enzo Ferrari , formerly a salesman and racing driver for Alfa Romeo , founded Scuderia Ferrari , a racing team, in 1929. Originally intended to service gentleman drivers and other amateur racers, Alfa Romeo's withdrawal from racing in 1933, combined with Enzo's connections within
738-599: A car with a similar powerplant (Peugeot 908). P2 cars can weigh much less — first 675 kg, then 750 kg and now 825 kg — but are restricted to 3400 cc V6 or V8 normally aspirated or 2000 cc turbocharged powerplants. In the European series in which endurance is a priority and P2s have been run largely by privateers, P2s have not challenged P1s for outright victories; in the American Le Mans Series with generally shorter races P2 has become
861-538: A crop of large-engined "big bangers" the technology of which largely gave rise to Can-Am but soon died out. Clubmans provided much entertainment at club-racing level from the 1960s into the 1990s and John Webb revived interest in big sports prototypes with Thundersports in the 1980s. There was even enough interest in Group C to sustain a C2 championship for a few years; at 'club' level Modified Sports Car ("ModSports") and Production Sports Car ("ProdSports") races remained
984-509: A feature of most British race meetings into the 1980s, evolving into a "Special GT" series that was essentially Formula Libre for sports or saloon cars. After a relative period of decline in the 1980s a British GT Championship emerged in the mid-90s. Italy found itself with both grassroots racing with a plethora of Fiat based specials (often termed "etceterinis") and small Alfa Romeos , and exotica such as Maserati and Ferrari – who also sold cars to domestic customers as well as racing on
1107-515: A franchise-like approval system in which only approved constructors are eligible, with rules stability enforced for several years at a time, although this led in 2007 to established constructors like Lola and Dallara entering the 2008 series by taking over the rights of existing constructors (Multimatic and Doran respectively). Grand Touring (from the Italian Gran Turismo ) racing is the most common form of sports car racing, and
1230-632: A high point in the history of the sport. In Europe, the FIA adopted the ACO GTP rules virtually unchanged and sanctioned the Group C World Endurance Championship (or World Sportscar Championship ), featuring high-tech closed-cockpit prototypes from Porsche, Aston Martin, Mercedes-Benz , Nissan , Jaguar and others. In the US, the IMSA Camel GTP series boasted close competition between huge fields of manufacturer-backed teams and privateer squads –
1353-456: A larger emphasis on the reliability and efficiency of the car and its drivers as opposed to outright car performance or driver skills. The FIA World Endurance Championship is an example of one of the best known sports car racing series. A type of hybrid between the purism of open-wheelers and the familiarity of touring car racing, this style is often best associated with the annual 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race. First run in 1923, Le Mans
SECTION 10
#17327905246311476-399: A long Japanese tradition of such hybrids; a Grand Champion series ran for many years with rebodied Formula 2 and Formula 3000 cars, rather similar to the second incarnation of Can-Am ). In the US, however, road racing actually saw a decline. The IMSA GT Championship had been prototype-based since 1983, with less emphasis on production cars. NASCAR was becoming increasingly dominant, and
1599-703: A mechanic if necessary or permitted. Cars such as the Bugatti Type 35 were almost equally at home in Grands Prix and endurance events, but specialisation gradually started to differentiate the sports-racer from the Grand Prix car. The legendary Alfa Romeo Tipo A Monoposto started the evolution of the true single-seater in the early 1930s; the Grand Prix racer and its miniature voiturette offspring rapidly evolved into high performance single seaters optimised for relatively short races, by dropping fenders and
1722-810: A number of GT series sprung up at national and European level, with the BPR series eventually evolving into the FIA GT Championship . IMSA GTP continued for a few more years but was replaced by a series for World Sports Cars – relatively simple open-top prototypes – which gave rise to cars such as the Ferrari 333SP and the Riley & Scott Mk 3, supported by GTs. As the 1990s progressed, these prototypes and others like them started to be raced in Europe and an FIA Sports Car series evolved for them. Since
1845-513: A race for touring cars ) and sports cars, whether descended from primarily road-going vehicles or developed from pure-bred racing cars came to dominate races such as Le Mans and the Mille Miglia . In open-road endurance races across Europe such as the Mille Miglia , Tour de France and Targa Florio , which were often run on dusty roads, the need for fenders and a mechanic or navigator was still there. As mainly Italian cars and races defined
1968-611: A rainbow of colours, and one 250 GT SWB , used as a test mule for the 250 GTO, was a rare non-red factory-backed car: it raced in blue. In a particularly noteworthy case from 1964, while protesting the FIA 's homologation requirements, the company moved its racing assets to the North American Racing Team , an affiliated team based in the United States. As a result, Ferrari and the driver John Surtees won
2091-424: A range of categories including Formula One and sports car racing , though the company has also worked in partnership with other teams. The earliest Ferrari entity, Scuderia Ferrari , was created in 1929—ten years before the founding of Ferrari proper—as a Grand Prix racing team. It was affiliated with automaker Alfa Romeo , for whom Enzo had worked in the 1920s. Alfa Romeo supplied racing cars to Ferrari, which
2214-496: A result, some cars racing in the GT category did pass as true sports prototypes, in turn leading to some road-going versions for homologation purposes. The Dauer- Porsche 962 LM, Porsche 911 GT1 -98, Mercedes CLK-GTR and Toyota GT-One were prime examples of prototypes masquerading as GTs. In simplistic terms, sports prototypes are two-seat racing cars with bodywork covering their wheels, and are as technically advanced and, depending on
2337-486: A result, sports car racing is seen more as a team endeavour than an individual sport, with team managers such as John Wyer , Tom Walkinshaw , driver-turned-constructor Henri Pescarolo , Peter Sauber and Reinhold Joest becoming almost as famous as some of their drivers. The prestige of storied marques such as Porsche , Audi , Chevrolet , Ferrari , Jaguar , Bentley , Aston Martin , Lotus , Maserati , Lamborghini , Alfa Romeo , Lancia , Mercedes-Benz , and BMW
2460-452: A resurgence of interest in sports car racing in the US, with the network originally showing a large amount of sports car racing and sports car–related programming before being replaced by Fox Sports. The IMSA GT Series evolved into the American Le Mans Series ; the European races eventually became the closely related Le Mans Series , both of which mix prototypes and GTs; the FIA remains more interested in its own GT and GT3 championships, with
2583-464: A significant update of this philosophy. The Tailor Made programme allows clients to work with designers in Maranello to make decisions at every step of the process. Through this program almost any trim, any exterior colour or any interior material is possible. The program carries on the original tradition and emphasizes the idea of each car being unique. The 1984 288 GTO is considered by some to be
SECTION 20
#17327905246312706-570: A single race, such as in the 24 Hours of Le Mans . In mixed-class races, an overall winner is awarded, though individual class winners are often recognised as well. Sports prototype is the name given to a type of car used in sports car racing and is effectively the next automotive design and technological step-up from road-going sports cars and are, along with open-wheel cars, the pinnacle of racing car design. The highest level in sports car racing, these cars are purpose-built racing cars with enclosed wheels, and either open or closed cockpits. Ever since
2829-616: A support series for the Rolex Series, provides a similar series to the old Trans Am Series, mixing conventional sports cars and touring cars. Due to Grand Am's affiliation with NASCAR, many NASCAR drivers occasionally participate in the Rolex Sports Car Series. Max Papis is a notable example in that he was a road racer prior to his tenure in the Sprint Cup Series. Many of these drivers only participate in
2952-419: A three-digit unitary displacement of an engine cylinder with an additional suffix representing the purpose of a vehicle. Therefore, Ferrari 125 S had 1.5 L (1,496.77 cc) V12 engine with a unitary displacement of 124.73 cc; whilst S-suffix represented Sport. Other race cars also received names invoking particular races such as Ferrari 166 MM for Mille Miglia. With the introduction of road-going models,
3075-592: A vehicle to increase performance as a season progresses, DPs are restricted to their original conception of the car from the start of the season. For these reasons, the category being labeled as a "prototype" has occasionally been criticised as misleading and being more in line with traditional "spec" race series prevalent in the United States. The intention of the DP formula was to provide a class in which tight technical regulations encouraged close competition and where budget would be relatively unimportant. DP chassis are subject to
3198-533: Is a form of motorsport road racing which utilises sports cars that have two seats and enclosed wheels. They may be either purpose-built sports prototypes which are the highest level in sports car racing or grand tourers (GT cars) based on road-going models and therefore, in general, not as fast as sports prototypes. Sports car racing is one of the main types of circuit auto racing , alongside open-wheel racing (such as Formula One , IndyCar Series and Super Formula Championship ), touring car racing (such as
3321-575: Is a one-make racing series for the Ferrari 458 . The FXX is not road legal and is therefore only used for track events. The first vehicle made with the Ferrari name was the 125 S . Only two of this small two-seat sports/racing V12 car were made. In 1949, the 166 Inter was introduced marking the company's significant move into the grand touring road car market. The first 166 Inter was a four-seat (2+2) berlinetta coupe with body work designed by Carrozzeria Touring Superleggera . Road cars quickly became
3444-527: Is always presented either as a shield, with the Italian tricolour above the horse and the initials SF (" Scuderia Ferrari ") below; or as a rectangle, replacing "SF" with the word "Ferrari" rendered in the company's trademark typeface. Enzo Ferrari offered an account of the horse's origins. In his story, after a 1923 victory in Ravenna , the family of Francesco Baracca , a deceased flying ace who painted
3567-401: Is built in part upon success in sports car racing. These makers' top road cars have often been very similar both in engineering and styling to those raced. This close association with the 'exotic' nature of the cars serves as a useful distinction between sports car racing and touring cars. The 12 Hours of Sebring , 24 Hours of Daytona , and 24 Hours of Le Mans have in the past been considered
3690-425: Is done by Ferrari, sometimes in cooperation with external design houses such as Pininfarina or Fioravanti , and the vehicles receive full homologation to be road legal. Since the creation of Ferrari's in-house styling centre in 2010 though, the focus has shifted away somewhat from outside coachbuilders and more towards creating new in-house designs for clients. The first car to be completed under this programme
3813-403: Is found all over the world, in both international and national series. Historically, Grand Touring cars had to be in series production, but in 1976 the class was split into production-based Group 4 Grand Touring Cars and Group 5 Special Production Cars , the latter of which were essentially pure-bred racing cars with production-lookalike bodies. GT racing gradually fell into abeyance in Europe in
Nordic Challenge Cup - Misplaced Pages Continue
3936-656: Is one of the oldest motor races still in existence. Other classic but now defunct sports car races include the Italian classics, the Targa Florio (1906–1977) and Mille Miglia (1927–1957), and the Mexican Carrera Panamericana (1950–1954). Most top-class sports car races emphasise endurance (generally between 6 and 24 hours), reliability, and strategy, over pure speed. Longer races usually involve complex pit strategy and regular driver changes. As
4059-625: Is the Ferrari Driver Academy . Begun in 2009, the initiative follows the team's successful grooming of Felipe Massa between 2003 and 2006. Drivers who are accepted into the Academy learn the rules and history of formula racing as they compete, with Ferrari's support, in feeder classes such as Formula Three and Formula 4 . As of 2019, 5 out of 18 programme inductees had graduated and become F1 drivers: one of these drivers, Charles Leclerc , came to race for Scuderia Ferrari, while
4182-695: The 125 F1 , was first raced at the 1948 Italian Grand Prix , where its encouraging performance convinced Enzo to continue the company's costly Grand Prix racing programme. Ferrari's first victory in an F1 series was at the 1951 British Grand Prix , heralding its strong performance during the 1950s and early 1960s: between 1952 and 1964, the team took home six World Drivers' Championships and one Constructors' Championship . Notable Ferrari drivers from this era include Alberto Ascari , Juan Manuel Fangio , Phil Hill , and John Surtees . Ferrari's initial fortunes ran dry after 1964, and its began to receive its titles in isolated sprees. Ferrari first started to slip in
4305-420: The 125 S , which was the marque's first car, and many subsequent Ferraris. The company saw success in motorsport almost as soon as it began racing: the 125 S won many races in 1947, and several early victories, including the 1949 24 Hours of Le Mans and 1951 Carrera Panamericana , helped build Ferrari's reputation as a high-quality automaker. Ferrari won several more races in the coming years, and early in
4428-447: The 2023 FIA World Endurance Championship , Ferrari, in partnership with AF Corse , fielded two 499P sports prototypes. To commemorate the company's return to the discipline, one of the cars was numbered "50", referencing the fifty years that had elapsed since a works Ferrari competed in an endurance race. The 499P finished first at the 2023 24 Hours of Le Mans , ending Toyota Gazoo Racing 's five-year winning streak there and becoming
4551-575: The ACO regulations, two categories of sports prototypes are now recognised: P1 and P2. Cars competing in the P1 category must weigh no less than 900 kg and are limited to 6000 cc naturally aspirated and 4000 cc turbocharged engines. 5500 cc turbo- Diesel engines are also permitted in P1 ;– Audi scored Le Mans victories with such a car in 2006, 2007 and 2008 and Peugeot returned to racing in 2007 with
4674-549: The British Touring Car Championship , which is based on 'saloon cars' as opposed to the 'exotics' seen in sports cars. Supercars Championship , is an Production Touring Car Racing specs consists with 5-litre V8 Engine and the fastest touring car racing in the world) and stock car racing (such as NASCAR ). Sports car races are often, though not always, endurance races that are run over particularly long distances or large amounts of time, resulting in
4797-457: The Ferrari 125 S —also the first Ferrari-branded sports car—became the first to wear it. For many years, rosso corsa ( ' racing red ' ) was the required colour of all Italian racing cars. It is also closely associated with Ferrari: even after livery regulations changed, allowing race teams to deviate from their national colours , Scuderia Ferrari continued to paint its cars bright red, as it does to this day. On Ferrari's road-going cars,
4920-509: The Mille Miglia , and two victories at the 24 Hours of Le Mans , among many other races These races were ideal environments for the development and promotion of Ferrari's earlier road cars, which were broadly similar to their racing counterparts. This luck continued into the first half of the 1960s, when Ferrari won the WSC's 2000GT class three consecutive times and finished first at Le Mans for six consecutive years. Its winning streak at Le Mans
5043-596: The Targa Florio and as they grew bigger (via the Porsche 910 to the Porsche 908 and finally the Porsche 917 ) the Stuttgart marque became first a competitor for overall wins and then came to dominate sports car racing – both they and Mercedes have made intermittent returns to the top level of the sport through the 1970s, 80s, 90s and 2010s. Sports car racing has intermittently been popular in Japan ;– in
Nordic Challenge Cup - Misplaced Pages Continue
5166-559: The Triple Crown of endurance car racing . And also the additional of Bathurst 12 Hour , Spa 24 Hours , Nürburgring 24 Hours and Suzuka 1000km are considered the Crown Jewel of Endurance race. According to historian Richard Hough , "It is obviously impossible to distinguish between the designers of sports cars and Grand Prix machines during the pre-1914 period. The late Georges Faroux contended that sports-car racing
5289-482: The World Sportscar Championship was conceived, there have been various regulations regarding bodywork, engine style and size, tyres and aerodynamics to which these cars must be built. Sports prototypes may be (and often are) one-of-a-kind machines, and need bear no relation to any road-going vehicle, although during the 1990s, some manufacturers exploited a loophole in the FIA and ACO rules. As
5412-466: The "HY-KERS Concept", Ferrari's hybrid system adds more than 100 horsepower on top of the 599 Fiorano's 612 hp. Also in mid-2014, the flagship LaFerrari was put into production featuring a hybrid system. Ferrari introduced their first plug-in hybrid (PHEV) model in 2019 with the SF90 Stradale , followed by the 296 in 2021. From the beginning, the Ferrari naming convention consisted of
5535-477: The 1950s and 1960s, Ferrari supplied Formula One cars to a number of private entrants and other teams. One famous example was Tony Vandervell 's team, which raced the Thinwall Special modified Ferraris before building their own Vanwall cars. The North American Racing Team 's entries in the final three rounds of the 1969 season were the last occasions on which a team other than Scuderia Ferrari entered
5658-875: The 1950s and 1960s, count among the most expensive cars ever sold at auction . Throughout its history, the company has been noted for its continued participation in racing , especially in Formula One , where its team, Scuderia Ferrari , is the series' single oldest and most successful. Scuderia Ferrari has raced since 1929, first in Grand Prix events and later in Formula One, where since 1952 it has fielded fifteen champion drivers , won sixteen Constructors' Championships , and accumulated more race victories, 1–2 finishes, podiums, pole positions, fastest laps and points than any other team in F1 history. Historically, Ferrari
5781-637: The 1950s its road cars were already a favourite of the international elite. Ferrari produced many families of interrelated cars, including the America , Monza , and 250 series, and the company's first series-produced car was the 250 GT Coupé , beginning in 1958. In 1960, Ferrari was reorganized as a public company . It soon began searching for a business partner to handle its manufacturing operations: it first approached Ford in 1963, though negotiations fell through; later talks with Fiat , who bought 50% of Ferrari's shares in 1969, were more successful. In
5904-403: The 1950s, sports car racing was regarded as almost as important as Grand Prix competition, with major marques like Ferrari , Maserati , Jaguar and Aston Martin investing much effort in their works programmes and supplying cars to customers; sports racers lost their close relationship to road-going sports cars in the 1950s and the major races were contested by dedicated competition cars such as
6027-515: The 1960s and 1970s. In Britain 2-litre sports cars were initially popular (the Bristol engine being readily available and cheap), subsequently 1100 cc sports racers became a very popular category for young drivers (effectively supplanting 500 cc F3), with Lola , Lotus , Cooper and others being very competitive, although at the other end of the scale in the early to mid-1960s the national sports racing scene also attracted sophisticated GTs and later
6150-424: The 1960s progressed, with worldwide battles between Ferrari, Ford, Porsche, Lotus, Alfa Romeo and Matra as well as other more specialist marques running on into the early 1970s. The competition at Le Mans even made it to the movie screens, with Steve McQueen 's film Le Mans . This era was seen by many as the highpoint of sports car racing, with the technology and performance of the cars comfortably in excess of what
6273-596: The 1960s small-capacity sports racers and even a local version of the Group 7 cars as raced in the Canadian-American Challenge Cup were popular; a healthy local sports prototype championship ran until the early 1990s and now the Super GT series provides high-budget exposure to manufacturers, with many international drivers appearing. The Japanese manufacturers have also been frequent visitors to
SECTION 50
#17327905246316396-634: The 1980s and 1990s, with silhouette cars continuing to race in IMSA races in the USA. When GT racing revived after the collapse of the World Sports Car Championship at the end of 1992, the lead in defining rules was taken by the ACO. Under the ACO rules, Grand Touring cars are divided into two categories, Grand Touring 1 (GT1, formerly GT) and Grand Touring 2 (GT2, formerly N-GT). As the name of
6519-694: The 24 Hours of Daytona. The original Trans-Am Series dissolved in 2006, but returned to action in 2009 with tube frame TA1 and TA2 divisions racing with production-based TA3-American and TA3-International divisions. In addition, the SCCA continues to provide a major support series for Trans-Am. This series, known as the SCCA World Challenge , consists of a one-hour race for each round, combining three classes: GT ( Chevrolet Corvette , Aston Martin DB9 , etc.), "GTS" ( Acura TSX , BMW 3 Series , etc.; replaced
6642-653: The ACO & FIA to come together to create the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) starting in 2012. This new series replaced the ILMC and was a spiritual successor to the former FIA World Sportscar Championship. In 2012, the Rolex Sports Car Series overhauled its Daytona Prototype class, allowing for production-based designs. The ALMS's new LMP/LMC format, however, has not held up. The prototype classes split again in 2011, with LMP1 having three cars and LMP2 having one. A new "GT Pro Am" class
6765-545: The ACO split GT2 into two categories, GTE-Pro (for all-professional teams with current-spec cars) and GTE-Am (for teams with one amateur and one professional per car using previous-spec cars), as a way to entice rookies to enter one of the three Le Mans Series. Ferrari Ferrari S.p.A. ( / f ə ˈ r ɑːr i / , Italian: [ferˈraːri] ) is an Italian luxury sports car manufacturer based in Maranello . Founded in 1939 by Enzo Ferrari (1898–1988),
6888-699: The ACO's rules the basis for the LMS and ALMS. The Le Mans Prototype is somewhat reminiscent of the old Can Am prototype. Further splits in the American scene saw the Grand American Road Racing Association form a separate series, the Rolex Sports Car Series , with its own GT and prototype rules aimed at providing cheaper, lower-cost racing for independent teams. Grand Am's Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge ,
7011-646: The Centro Stile Ferrari for the design of all its road cars. The Ferrari F12 was the last Ferrari production model to feature Pininfarina design, although Ferrari has stated that they will continue to collaborate with Pininfarina on special projects. The Ferrari SF90 Stradale is the first-ever Ferrari to feature PHEV (Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle) architecture which sees the internal combustion engine integrated with three electric motors, two of which are independent and located on
7134-467: The Constructors' Championship in 1982 and 1983. Following another drought in the 1980s and 1990s, Ferrari saw a long winning streak in the 2000s, largely through the work of Michael Schumacher . After signing onto the team in 1996, Schumacher gave Ferrari five consecutive drivers' titles between 2000 and 2004; this was accompanied by six consecutive constructors' titles, beginning in 1999. Ferrari
7257-669: The Continental Challenge's Grand Sport class, promoting its other touring car class to "GTS". This came after several years of the old TC class being an Acura-BMW- Mazda affair. For 2012, the series adopted a "B-spec" touring car class comparable to that of the Continental Challenge's Street Tuner class. 2010 also saw the introduction of the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup (ILMC) by the ACO, featuring events in America, Asia and Europe. This in turn led
7380-522: The Daytona oval and prohibitively expensive for smaller teams to run. Compared to the LMPs, DPs are severely limited in terms of approved technology; for instance, they are required to be constructed of steel tube frames with carbon-fibre skins, rather than being carbon-fibre monocoques, and must use production-based engines. In addition, contrary to their European counterparts who continuously alter and develop
7503-514: The F1 World Drivers' Championship posthumously in 1970, and Jackie Oliver . The series also launched the career of Leo Kinnunen who went on to win the World Sportscar Championship the next year. This sports car racing -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This motorsport-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Sports car racing Sports car racing
SECTION 60
#17327905246317626-534: The February 1967 24 Hours of Daytona with the 330 P4 . Only in the 1973 Daytona 24 Hours, a 365 GTB/4 run by NART (who raced Ferraris in America) ran second, behind a Porsche 911 . The various Dino models were named for Enzo's son, Dino Ferrari, and were marketed as Dinos by Ferrari and sold at Ferrari dealers – for all intents and purposes they are Ferraris. In the mid-1990s, Ferrari added
7749-561: The French car industry switched from making large powerful cars to small utilitarian ones, French sports cars of the 1950s and early 1960s tended to be small-capacity and highly aerodynamic (often based on Panhard or Renault components), aimed at winning the "Index of Performance" at Le Mans and Reims and triumphing in handicap races. Between the late 1960s and late 1970s, Matra and Renault made significant and successful efforts to win at Le Mans. In Germany, domestic production based racing
7872-563: The IndyCar Series' split from CART in 1996 put more emphasis on ovals regarding domestic open-wheel racing. Also contributing to the decline was the retirement of Mario Andretti from Formula One. It would be over a decade before another American driver would join Formula One, viz. Scott Speed , although Speed was ultimately unsuccessful and eventually joined NASCAR himself. The debut of the SpeedVision television network brought
7995-427: The Italian military; the contracts for these goods were lucrative, and provided the new company with a great deal of capital. In 1943, under threat of Allied bombing raids, the company's factory was moved to Maranello . Though the new facility was nonetheless bombed twice, Ferrari remains in Maranello to this day. In 1945, Ferrari adopted its current name. Work started promptly on a new V12 engine that would power
8118-613: The Jaguar C and D types, the Mercedes 300SLR, Maserati 300S, Aston Martin DBR1 and assorted Ferraris including the first Testa Rossas. Top Grand Prix drivers also competed regularly in sports car racing. After major accidents at the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans and the 1957 Mille Miglia the power of sports cars was curbed with a 3-litre engine capacity limit applied to them in the World Championship from 1958. From 1962 sports cars temporarily took
8241-527: The NASCAR-owned Grand Am series. The ALMS has now introduced "GTE-PRO" and "GTE-AM" for endurance races. In 2014, American Le Mans Series and Rolex Sports Car Series were merged into United SportsCar Championship , with IMSA as its sanctioning body. Fox Sports 1 (successor of Speed Channel) was returned as main broadcaster of the unified series. Daytona Prototype was replaced in 2017 by Daytona Prototype International (DPi), which based on
8364-514: The SCCA's World Challenge, and failing to garner a television contract. A major factor in this is the fact that Trans Am's teams still use vehicles dating back to 1999. In most other series, teams tended to update their vehicles every few years or so (examples include the 2005 vs. 2010 Mustangs in the Continental Challenge and the two different generations of Mazda RX-8 in the Rolex Series). Other television changes include Speed Channel losing
8487-591: The US sports car scene ( Nissan and Toyota in particular during the heyday of IMSA) and to the European scene, in particular Le Mans, where despite many years of trying by all the main Japanese marques the only victory to have been scored by a Japanese marque was by Mazda in 1991, until 2018 when Toyota scored a first and second-place finish. Toyota followed this with another 1-2 finish in 2019. Powerful prototypes (effectively pure-bred two-seater racing cars with no real link to production vehicles) started to appear as
8610-426: The US, imported Italian, German and British cars battled local hybrids, with initially very distinct East and West Coast scenes; these gradually converged and a number of classic races and important teams emerged including Camoradi , Briggs Cunningham and so on. The US scene tended to feature small MG and Porsche cars in the smaller classes, and imported Jaguar, Maserati, Mercedes-Benz, Allard and Ferrari cars in
8733-462: The bulk of Ferrari sales. The early Ferrari road cars typically featured bodywork designed and customised by independent coachbuilders such as Vignale , Touring , Ghia , Pininfarina , Scaglietti and Bertone . The original Ferrari road cars were typically two-seat front-engined V12s. This platform served Ferrari well through the 1950s and 1960s. In 1967, the V6 powered Dino 206 GT was introduced as
8856-405: The cars were technically similar to Group Cs but used a sliding scale of weights and engine capacities to try to limit performance. Both Group C and GTP had secondary categories, respectively Group C2 and Camel Lights, for less powerful cars, targeting entries by small specialist constructors or serious amateur teams. The FIA attempted to make Group C into a virtual "two seater Grand Prix" format in
8979-505: The class implies, the exterior of the car closely resembles that of the production version, while the internal fittings may differ greatly. GT2 cars are very similar to the FIA GT2 classification, and are considered 'pure' GT cars; that is production exotic cars with relatively few internal modifications for racing. The Porsche 911 is currently the most popular car in the GT2 class. 2009 will be
9102-444: The colour has always been among the company's most popular choices: in 2012, 40 per cent of Ferraris left the factory painted red, while in the early 1990s the figure was even higher, at 85 per cent. Some Ferrari vehicles, such as the 288 GTO , have only been made available in red. Although rosso corsa is the colour most associated with Ferrari, it has not always been the colour of choice. Ferraris raced by privateers have run in
9225-515: The company "Auto Avio Costruzioni", and headquartered it in the facilities of the old Scuderia Ferrari; due to a noncompete agreement with Alfa Romeo, the company could not use the Ferrari name for another four years. The company produced a single car, the Auto Avio Costruzioni 815 , which participated in only one race before the outbreak of World War II . During the war, Enzo's company produced aircraft engines and machine tools for
9348-472: The company built its first car in 1940, adopted its current name in 1945, and began to produce its current line of road cars in 1947. Ferrari became a public company in 1960, and from 1963 to 2014 it was a subsidiary of Fiat S.p.A. It was spun off from Fiat's successor entity, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles , in 2016. The company currently offers a large model range which includes several supercars , grand tourers , and one SUV . Many early Ferraris, dating to
9471-573: The company's F2 programme led directly to the creation of the Dino engine , which came to power various racing and road Ferraris. The final non-F1 formula in which Ferrari competed was the Tasman Series , wherein Chris Amon won the 1969 championship in a Dino 246 Tasmania . At least two water speed record boats have utilized Ferrari powertrains, both of them 800kg-class hydroplanes from
9594-509: The company, turned Scuderia Ferrari into its unofficial representative on the track. Alfa Romeo supplied racing cars to Ferrari, who eventually amassed some of the best drivers of the 1930s and won many races before the team's liquidation in 1937. Late in 1937, Scuderia Ferrari was liquidated and absorbed into Alfa Romeo, but Enzo's disagreements with upper management caused him to leave in 1939. He used his settlement to found his own company, where he intended to produce his own cars. He called
9717-482: The demise of Group C (where Japan and Germany both had successful series of their own) Japan has largely gone its own way in sports car racing; the Super GT series is for very highly modified production-based cars; although prototypes are slowly returning to Japanese racing in the Japan Le Mans Challenge many of these 'prototypes' are little more than rebodied Formula 3 cars (although there has been
9840-426: The early 1950s. Neither boat was built by or affiliated with Ferrari, though one of them, Arno XI , had its engine order approved directly by Enzo Ferrari. Arno XI still holds the top speed record for an 800kg hydroplane. Since 2019, Scuderia Ferrari has participated in sim racing . Throughout its history, Ferrari has supplied racing cars to other entrants, aside from its own works Scuderia Ferrari team. In
9963-564: The early 1990s, Ferrari followed a three-number naming scheme based on engine displacement and a number of cylinders: Most Ferraris were also given designations referring to their body style. In general, the following conventions were used: This naming system can be confusing, as some entirely different vehicles used the same engine type and body style. Many Ferraris also had other names affixed (such as Daytona) to identify them further. Many such names are actually not official factory names. The Daytona name commemorates Ferrari's triple success in
10086-507: The early 1990s, with engine rules in common with F1, short race distances, and a schedule dovetailing with that of the F1 rounds. This drove up costs and drove away entrants and crowds, and by 1993 prototype racing was dead in Europe, with the Peugeot , Jaguar, Toyota and Mercedes-Benz teams all having withdrawn. In an attempt to provide a top-class endurance racing series to replace the WSPC,
10209-493: The emblem on his airplane, paid him a visit. Paolina de Biancoli, Francesco's mother, suggested that Ferrari adopt the horse as a good luck charm: he accepted the request, and the Prancing Horse was first used by his racing team in 1932, applied to their Alfa Romeo 8C with the addition of a canary yellow background—the "colour of Modena ", Enzo's hometown. The rectangular Prancing Horse has been used since 1947, when
10332-438: The first Ferrari in 58 years to win the race. Ferrari repeated this feat at the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans , marking its first consecutive victory at the race since 1965. From 1932 to 1935 Scuderia Ferrari operated a motorcycle racing division, which was conceived as a way to scout and train future Grand Prix drivers. Instead of Italian motorcycles, the team used British ones manufactured by Norton and Rudge . Though Ferrari
10455-727: The first in the line of Ferrari flagship "supercars". This pedigree is considered to extend through the F40 , F50 , Enzo and the LaFerrari . These are sometimes referred to by collectors as the "Big 5". Ferrari has produced a handful of concept cars such as the Modulo , Mythos , and Pinin . Some of these were quite radical and never intended for production, while others showed styling elements that were later incorporated into production models. Most of Ferrari's concept cars have been collaborations with design studio Pininfarina . The most recent concept car to be produced by Ferrari themselves
10578-424: The first production rear mid-engined car built by Ferrari. The 206 GT was sold under the lower cost Dino marque, named after Enzo Ferrari's late son, and sold in greater numbers than any previous Ferrari model. The first rear mid-engine model to be sold under the Ferrari name came in 1973 with the flat 12 powered Berlinetta Boxer . This rear mid-engine layout would go on to be used in many Ferraris continuing into
10701-399: The former touring car class), and Touring Car (a "showroom stock" class similar to Grand Am's Continental Challenge). The Trans Am series returned in 2009, but has yet to establish a television contract. The 2010s have seen a major overhaul of sports car racing in the United States. The Pirelli World Challenge reformatted in 2010 to have a showroom stock touring car group comparable to that of
10824-438: The four ACO homologated LMP2 chassis made by Dallara , Onroak (Ligier) , Oreca , and Riley - Multimatic , with brand bodywork and homologated engines. Manufacturers are asked to partner with a privateer team, and each car will sport manufacturer bodywork, corresponding to their brand-identity. These rules are made to both control costs and attract manufacturers to the series. In 2018, SRO Motorsports Group has taken over
10947-575: The front axle, with the third at the rear between the engine and the gearbox. In the 1950s and 1960s, clients often personalized their vehicles as they came straight from the factory. This philosophy added to the mystique of the brand at the time. Every Ferrari that came out of Maranello could be built to an individual customer's specification. Ferrari formalized this concept with its earlier Carrozzeria Scaglietti programme. The options offered here were more typical such as racing seats, rearview cameras, and other special trim. In late 2011, Ferrari announced
11070-514: The genre, the category came to be known as Gran Turismo (particularly in the 1950s), as long distances had to be travelled, rather than running around on short circuits only. Reliability and some basic comfort were necessary in order to endure the task. After the Second World War , sports car racing emerged as a distinct form of racing with its own classic races, and, from 1953, its own FIA sanctioned World Sportscar Championship . In
11193-716: The hiring of Michael Schumacher and Jean Todt ), and the production of three more flagship cars: the F50 , the Enzo , and the LaFerrari . In addition to his leadership of Ferrari, Montezemolo was also the chairman of Fiat proper between 2004 and 2010. After Montezemolo resigned, he was replaced in quick succession by many new chairmen and CEOs. He was succeeded first by Sergio Marchionne , who would oversee Ferrari's initial public offering and subsequent spin-off from Fiat Chrysler Automobiles , and then by Louis Camilleri as CEO and John Elkann as chairman. Beginning in 2021, Camilleri
11316-530: The larger classes. A breed of powerful hybrids appeared in the 50s and 60s and raced on both sides of the Atlantic, featuring European chassis and large American engines – from the early Allard cars via hybrids such as Lotus 19s fitted with large engines through to the AC Cobra . The combination of mostly British chassis and American V8 engines gave rise to the popular and spectacular Can-Am series in
11439-450: The last run of the GT1 class as a result of budgeting issues. GT1 teams are currently enlisting to run their cars in the GT2 class next year. The American Le Mans Series also runs a "GT-Challenge" class, which currently only uses Porsche 911 GT3 Cups but will open to other cars next year. This category is designed for privateer and rookie teams as an easier way to enter the series. For 2011,
11562-403: The late 1960s, when it was outclassed by teams using the inexpensive, well-engineered Cosworth DFV engine. The team's performance improved markedly in the mid-1970s thanks to Niki Lauda , whose skill behind the wheel granted Ferrari a drivers' title in 1975 and 1977; similar success was accomplished in following years by the likes of Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve . The team also won
11685-596: The late 1990s. Such private teams as the American Risi Competizione and Italian AF Corse teams have been very successful with Ferrari GT racers over the years. This car, made for endurance sportscar racing to compete against such racing versions of the Audi R8 , McLaren MP4-12C , and BMW Z4 (E89) has proven to be successful, but not as successful as its predecessor, the F430 . The Ferrari Challenge
11808-505: The letter "F" to the beginning of all models (a practice abandoned after the F512 M and F355 , but adopted again with the F430 , but not with its successor, the Ferrari 458 ). Ferrari's symbol is the "Prancing Horse" ( Italian : Cavallino Rampante , lit. ' little prancing horse ' ), a prancing black horse on a yellow background. Minor details of its appearance have changed many times, but its shape has remained consistent: it
11931-482: The management of Pirelli World Challenge , with USAC as its sanctioning body since 2017. Beginning in 2019, NBC Sports will be replacing Fox Sports as main broadcaster of WeatherTech SportsCar Championship with six-year broadcasting rights. There are many kinds of sports cars that compete, but they can be broadly broken down into two main categories: Sports prototypes and Grand Touring (GT) cars. These two categories (or "classes") are often mixed together in
12054-798: The most active prototype category with serious involvement from Porsche and Acura and whereas P2 in Europe tends to involve races of attrition, in the US series the P2s, particularly the Porsche RS Spyder are often quicker round a lap than P1s, with the Porsche having scored many overall victories against the Audis in P1. Prototype rules for 2010 and beyond will encourage production-based engines (GT1 engines in LMP1, GT2 engines in LMP2) and rules to equalise
12177-529: The other four signed to other teams. Non-graduate drivers have participated in racing development, filled consultant roles, or left the Academy to continue racing in lower-tier formulae. Aside from an abortive effort in 1940, Ferrari began racing sports cars in 1947, when the 125 S won six out of the ten races it participated in. Ferrari continued to see similar luck in the years to follow: by 1957, just ten years after beginning to compete, Ferrari had won three World Sportscar Championships , seven victories in
12300-504: The performance of petrol and diesel LMP1s are also being addressed. Daytona Prototypes are a product of the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series , and offer a different interpretation of the prototype theme. DPs, as they are often called, are closed-cockpit, purpose-built racing machines which are less expensive and (deliberately) somewhat slower than Le Mans Prototypes, which were becoming dangerously quick on
12423-466: The premier form of "sports car" racing from 1976, with prototypes going into a general decline apart from Porsche 936 domination at Le Mans and a lower-key series of races for smaller two-litre Group 6 prototypes. A peculiarly American form of sports car racing was the Can-Am series, in which virtually unlimited sports prototypes competed in relatively short races. This series ran from 1966 to 1974 and
12546-474: The present day. Current Ferrari road cars typically use V8 or V12 engines, with V8 models making up over half of the marque's total production. For a time, Ferrari built 2+2 versions of its mid-engined V8 cars. Although they looked quite different from their 2-seat counterparts, both the GT4 and Mondial were closely related to the 308 GTB. The company has also produced several front-engined 2+2 cars, culminating in
12669-409: The recent V12 model Lusso and V8 models Roma , Portofino and Lusso T . The California is credited with initiating the popular current model line of V8 front-engined 2+2 grand touring performance sports cars. Starting in the early 2010s with the LaFerrari , Ferrari shifted its focus away from using independent coachbuilders, most notably Pininfarina , to instead relying on in-house design from
12792-437: The regulations they are built to, as quick as or quicker than their single-seat counterparts. Although not widely known, sports-prototypes (along with Formula 1 cars) are responsible for introducing the most numbers of new technologies and ideas to motorsport, including rear-wings, ground effect 'venturi' tunnels, fan-assisted aerodynamics and dual-shift gearboxes. Some of these technologies eventually filter down to road cars. In
12915-471: The rights to almost every series. The World Challenge was transferred to Versus, while the ALMS was transferred to an ESPN/ABC partnership. ALMS races are shown live online with a telecast the following day (although Speed still has the rights to the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which is still televised live). For 2012, some races will be televised live. Speed, having a partnership with NASCAR, still has exclusive rights to
13038-439: The second half of the decade, Ferrari also produced two cars that upended its more traditional models: the 1967 Dino 206 GT , which was its first mass-produced mid-engined road car, and the 1968 365 GTB/4 , which possessed streamlined styling that modernised Ferrari's design language. The Dino in particular was a decisive movement away from the company's conservative engineering approach, where every road-going Ferrari featured
13161-581: The second seat. During the later 1930s, French constructors, unable to keep up with the progress of the Mercedes-Benz and Auto-Union cars in GP racing, withdrew into primarily domestic competition with large-capacity sports cars – marques such as Delahaye , Talbot and the later Bugattis were locally prominent. Similarly, through the 1920s and 1930s the road-going sports/GT car started to emerge as distinct from fast tourers (Le Mans had originally been
13284-491: The suffix Inter was added, inspired by the Scuderia Inter racing team of Igor Troubetzkoy. Popular at that time 166 -series had 2.0 L (1,995.02 cc) engines with 166.25 cc of unitary displacement and a very diverse 250 -series had 3.0 L (2,953.21 cc) of total displacement and 246.10 cc of unitary. Later series of road cars were renamed Europa and top-of-the-line series America and Superamerica. Until
13407-433: The team then tuned and adjusted to their desired specifications. Scuderia Ferrari was highly successful in the 1930s: between 1929 and 1937 the team fielded such top drivers as Antonio Ascari , Giuseppe Campari , and Tazio Nuvolari , and won 144 out of its 225 races. Ferrari returned to Grand Prix racing in 1947, which was at that point metamorphosing into modern-day Formula One. The team's first homebuilt Grand Prix car,
13530-453: The world stage. Road races such as the Mille Miglia included everything from stock touring cars to World Championship contenders. The Mille Miglia was the largest sporting event in Italy until a fatal accident caused its demise in 1957. The Targa Florio , another tough road race, remained part of the world championship until the 1970s and remained as a local race for many years afterwards. As
13653-556: Was added. Initially, this format was only to be used in endurance races, but was eventually applied to all races. For 2012, only a handful of LMPs are being entered, with almost all of them being powered by Japanese manufacturers ( Nissan , Honda , etc.). The British manufacturer Morgan has entered a Judd -powered LMP. Aston Martin Racing , who for several years had entered an LMP, has returned to GT for 2012. The reformatted Trans-Am Series remained stagnant, being heavily overshadowed by
13776-407: Was also highly active in sports car racing , where its cars took many wins in races such as the Mille Miglia , Targa Florio and 24 Hours of Le Mans , as well as several overall victories in the World Sportscar Championship . Scuderia Ferrari fans, commonly called tifosi , are known for their passion and loyalty to the team. Ferrari is one of the world's strongest brands , and it maintains
13899-609: Was an expansion of the USRRC that conformed to FIA Group 7 rules. The original Can-Am fell victim to rising costs and the energy crisis . The ACO, organisers of the Le Mans 24 Hours, attempted to come up with a formula that would encourage more prototypes back to the race but would also be relatively economical – their Grand Touring Prototype rules in the late 1970s, based on fuel consumption rules, gave rise to two different varieties of sports car racing that were widely held to be
14022-449: Was broken by Ford in 1966, and though Ferrari would win two more WSC titles—one in 1967 and another in 1972 —poor revenue allocation, combined with languishing performance in Formula One, led the company to cease competing in sports car events in 1973. From that point onward, Ferrari would help prepare sports racing cars for privateer teams, but would not race them itself. In 2023, Ferrari reentered prototype sports car racing. For
14145-420: Was especially dominant in the 2004 season , where it lost only three races. After Schumacher's departure, Ferrari won one more drivers' title—given in 2007 to Kimi Räikkönen —and two constructors' titles in 2007 and 2008. These are the team's most recent titles to date; as of late, Ferrari has struggled to outdo recently ascendant teams such as Red Bull and Mercedes-Benz . Ferrari's junior driver programme
14268-526: Was largely dominated by BMW , Porsche and Mercedes-Benz , although sports car/GT racing gradually became eclipsed by touring cars and the initially sports car based Deutsche Rennsport Meisterschaft gradually evolved into the Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft . Porsche started to evolve a line of sports prototypes from the late 1950s; noted for their toughness and reliability they started to win in races of attrition such as
14391-467: Was not born until the first 24 Hours of Le Mans race in 1923 , and while as a joint-creator of that race he may have been prejudiced in his opinion, it is certainly true that sports-car racing as it was known after 1919 did not exist before the First World War." In the 1920s, the cars used in endurance racing and Grand Prix were still basically identical, with fenders and two seats, to carry
14514-408: Was replaced as CEO by Benedetto Vigna , who has announced plans to develop Ferrari's first fully electric model. During this period, Ferrari has expanded its production, owing to a global increase in wealth, while becoming more selective with its licensing deals. Since the company's beginnings, Ferrari has been involved in motorsport. Through its works team , Scuderia Ferrari , it has competed in
14637-455: Was replaced in 1991 by Luca Cordero di Montezemolo , under whose 23-year-long chairmanship the company greatly expanded. Between 1991 and 2014, he increased the profitability of Ferrari's road cars nearly tenfold, both by increasing the range of cars offered and through limiting the total number produced. Montezemolo's chairmanship also saw an expansion in licensing deals, a drastic improvement in Ferrari's Formula One performance (not least through
14760-657: Was seen in Formula 1. Homologation saw many out-and-out racing cars produced in sufficient quantities to see them classed as production vehicles; the FIA responded by placing more restrictions on even the allegedly production-based cars and placed draconian limits on the power available to prototypes – these prototypes of the late 1960s/early 1970s were comfortably quicker than contemporary Grand Prix machinery and for 1972 they were constrained to run much smaller engines to F1 rules, often de-tuned for endurance. Group 4 Grand Touring Cars and Group 5 Special Production Cars became
14883-493: Was successful on two wheels, winning three national titles and 44 overall victories, it was eventually pushed out of the discipline both by the obsolescence of pushrod motorcycle engines and broader economic troubles stemming from the Great Depression . Ferrari formerly participated in a variety of non-F1 open-wheel series. As early as 1948, Ferrari had developed cars for Formula Two and Formula Libre events, and
15006-487: Was the 2008 SP1 , commissioned by a Japanese business executive. The second was the P540 Superfast Aperta , commissioned by an American collector. The following is a list of Special Projects cars that have been made public: An F430 Spider that runs on ethanol was displayed at the 2008 Detroit Auto Show . At the 2010 Geneva Motor Show , Ferrari unveiled a hybrid version of their flagship 599 . Called
15129-718: Was the 2010 Millechili . A number of one-off special versions of Ferrari road cars have also been produced, commissioned to coachbuilders by wealthy owners. Examples include the P4/5 and the 612 Kappa . The Special Projects programme, also called the Portfolio Coachbuilding Programme, was launched in 2008 as a way to revive the tradition of past one-off and limited production coachbuilt Ferrari models, allowing clients to work with Ferrari and top Italian coachbuilders to create bespoke bodied models based on modern Ferrari road cars. Engineering and design
#630369