With his back against the wall and desperate for cash to keep Ferrari afloat in 1962 Enzo Ferrari fell out with many who crossed his path including potential saviours Ford, which led directly to Ford initiating it’s GT40 competition program, Count Giovanni Volpi di Misurata who promptly employed Ferrari’s recently departed designer Giotto Bizzarrini to develop and build the legendary Ferrari 250 Breadvan, and agricultural machinery magnate Ferruccio Lamborghini, the latter who allegedly fell out over the shade of red his car was to be painted.
Ferruccio Lamborghini, undertook to build a GT car to compete with the best Ferrari could build and employed Giotto Bizzarrini to design the motor and chassis.
Bizzarrini moved on to ISO Rivolta before the design was ready for production and Gian Paolo Dallara working with Paolo Stanzani and Bob Wallace were employed to complete the task.
The first Lamborghini, GTV, appeared at the Turin Motor show in October 1963 and went into production the following year by which time the substantially redesigned for the road model was known as the 350 GT powered by the Bizzarrini inspired 4 cam V12 which could easily be tuned to give 400hp.
With just 270hp the 350 GT was capable of nearly 160 mph. The bodies were built by Touring of Turin, the chassis by Marchesi and the motors in Lamborghini’s own factory in Sant’Agata, Bolognese.
It is thought 135 350 GT’s, like the one seen here at Carmel Conours by The Sea, were built of which 85 are believed to have survived.
This particular car was found in France by the current owner and is in preserved original condition having only been serviced and cleaned.
I believe the 350GT would originally have been fitted with oblong headlights which may have been changed to the current quad round set up to meet US regulations.
My thanks to Geoffrey Horton for sharing his photographs of today’s featured car.
Thanks for joining me on this ‘Out Of Disagreement’ edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at an extraordinary special built by the equally extraordinary John Bolster. Don’t forget to come back now !
