Maranello, 4 December, 2015

It was a flying visit- and not his first – but he just had to touch base with the place of his childhood dreams. Restauranteur, TV personality, rock singer and, from next spring, one of the presenters of the Italian version of Top Gear, Joe Bastianich took advantage of a break in shooting to pop down to Maranello.

Bastianich’s first stop was at the 8 and 12-cylinder assembly lines where he happily posed for selfies with the Ferrari employees who, of course, recognised him instantly. Then he lingered at length in the Classiche Department before finishing his visit with a viewing of the new F12tdf.

“I grew up in Italy and the US,” he told us. “As a kid, I had one great dream: Ferrari. I had a poster of the Testarossa on my bedroom wall and every time I flew back to the States, I bought a new model car in Rome Airport. The first Ferrari I remember was the 456 owned by my next-door neighbour. I bought one as soon as I could afford it. I had others too, including a 550 Maranello and a 612. But then I got the classic car bug: one of the ones I’m most proud of is a 1963 330, the same model John Lennon owned”.
And what about the current range? “You just can’t help but be gobsmacked by the LaFerrari or this F12tdf, which, apart from anything else, has a strong connection to Prancing Horse history”.