Friday's Ferrari

This car took part in the HGPCA Sports Car Race at the Christie's International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1992.

It's described in the programme of the event as a 1958 Ferrari 250TR, but has had a chequered history, being built in 1956 as a Ferrari 290 MM with chassis #0606 and a 3,491cc V12 engine. As a Scuderia Ferrari car it won the 1956 Swedish Grand Prix in the hands of Maurice Trintignant and Phil Hill, then in the 1957 season was raced by the Ecurie Nationale Belge. At the end of the season it returned to the Ferrari factory and was loaned out during 1958, then in 1959 it was converted to Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa specifications with a 2,953cc V12 engine. It was sold as a Ferrari 250 TR to Brazilian Jean Luis Lacerda Soares who raced the car in 1960, but in 1962 Fernando Moriera borrowed it to race at Interlagos and the front half of the car was totally wrecked in an accident during the race that killed the driver. The less damaged rear part of the car was used to create an Corvette V8 engined special which was used through the 1960s after which the engine was removed and the rest of the car was untouched until the mid 1980s when it was brought to the UK. The new owner, Paolo Sebastiani was under the impression that he had the remains of a Testa Rossa #0726 and had the remains reconstructed as that car, which is how it appeared at this Silverstone race where it was driven by Paolo Sebastiani. It was then sold in the 1990s to a John Godfrey who did some detailed research and found that the remains were of the 290MM, #0606, and when John Godfrey later died the current owner bought the car from his estate and commissioned Neil Twyman to return it to the same specification it was when it last left the Ferrari factory in 1959.