Ferrari Racing Days

- Ferrari Shell Historical Challenge, 3rd & 4th heat -

Nürburgring, July 20, 1996

20. Juli 1996 Nürburgring

Since Ferrari usually organize a special event on the factory-owned circuit of Mugello near Florence at the end of a year, and since the Belgian Ferrari-importer Jacques Swaters has been hosting the annual "Ferrari Days" at Spa-Francorchamps for several years in a row by now, it seemed to be the time for Ferrari Deutschland Ltd., Germany's factory-owned importer founded in 1989, to organize an important Ferrari-event in Germany as well. Thus, the Nürburgring, Germany's famous racetrack in the Eifel mountains, faced the first "Ferrari Racing Days" on July 20 and 21, 1996.

For the real enthusiast, the world premiere of the F512 M's successor, the 550 Maranello, as well as demonstration laps of Michael Schumacher in an F310 Formula 1 could not outdo the races of the "Shell Ferrari Historical Challenge" since each of the cars entered in this series once helped to form the myth of Ferrari.

The bunch of 44 cars (also including six pre-war Alfa Romeos) had been devided into six categories. On the pole was the Swiss Ferrari-agent Walo Schibler, who drove the 512 M s/n 1018 of Engelbert E. Stieger.

This sportscar had been sold new in 1970 to a German, the real-estate tycoon Georg Loos of Cologne, who at that time ran his so-called "GELO Racing Team". Schibler, winning both of the heats, could well repeat his performance of the practice session, while David Piper could not: After having been the 2nd in training, he was a non-starter in the race due to a technical problem which had occurred on his well-known 330 P2 s/n 0836.

Gary Pearson had reached the third position in practice driving Brandon Wang's 250 LM s/n 5903,

followed by Tommy Brorsson, Christoph Stieger and Corrado Cupellini, each of them piloting a Dino 206 SP (s/n 016, s/n 010 and s/n 026).

Three 365 GTB/4 Daytona Competizione had been entered in the event, too; Swiss Nicolas Bührer and his s/n 15225 were the quickest of the three couples in the qualifying session, which is somehow no wonder since Bührer has been the owner of his extremely powerful car for more than 20 years and hence obviously knows very well how to handle it.

Emanuele Pirro, former F1-pilot and current star of Audi's team in the German STW Cup, was very close (four seconds) behind Bührer when a technical problem forced him to abandon his 365 GTB/4 Daytona Competizione s/n 14885 in the pits. Later, owner Harald Mergard gave his 375 MM Spider Pinin Farina s/n 0376AM, which he had driven in the qualifying, to Pirro for the race. Being a professional racer, Pirro managed to reach the 8th position in the 2nd heat on Sunday, despite of the fact that all the better ranking cars were at least nine years younger than the 42 year old 375 MM!

In 1954, it had been piloted to 6th OA in the Carrera Panamericana by N.A.R.T.-founder Luigi Chinetti, and after an extensive restoration, it can be admired today in the same livery with "1 - 2 - 3"-sponsoring like 42 years ago!

Restorer David Cottingham, who did enter his 500 TRC Spider Scaglietti s/n 0682MDTR in the Ferrari Shell Historical Challenge, had also restored another 375 MM: s/n 0370AM, owned by Peter Gläsel. His son Christian drove the car on the Nürburgring while Mr. Gläsel himself chased his 250 TR Spider Scaglietti s/n 0742TR around the circuit.

In the category of the oldest Ferrari one could also see Fritz Grashei and Jean Sage, each of them driving an 860 Monza Spider Scaglietti (s/n 0602M and s/n 0604M). Both of the cars had once been piloted by the famous Juan Manuel Fangio. Although nothing happened to him nor to his 860 Monza, it was not a lucky day for Jean Sage since François-Xavier Entremont, who drove his 250 GT SWB Berlinetta Competizione s/n 2165GT, badly crashed the car into the pitwall after spinning on lost oil. Fortunately, the driver remained unhurt (while the car, well, did not...).

Ten 250 GTs had been brought to the Nürburgring, including P. Paul Pappalardo's 250 GTO '63 s/n 5111GT; 33 years ago, this very car had been driven to 1st OA in the Tour de France by Guichet and Behra.

Another very special Ferrari at the "Ring" was Antoine Midy's 121 LM Spider Scaglietti s/n 0558LM. Being Ferrari's first six-cylinder model, the 121 LM did - quite unusually - get its name from the factory internal designation of the engine-type, while the names of most of the other models did have their origin in the displacement per cylinder (e.g., 250 x 12 = 3.000).

In the qualifying, the quickest of all spyders was Walter Schäfer's 500 TR Spider Scaglietti s/n 0636MDTR; well, this was not only the driver's achievement since this car's original four-cylinder engine had been replaced by a V12 of a 250 GT years ago.

Although having a twelve-cylinder engine, the little 166 MM Barchetta Touring s/n 0040M of Sally Mason-Styrron was the slowest car on the track this weekend. The Brit did drive her "little boat" for the same motto which each Ferrarista should have had in mind during this great event: "Just be part of it!"