The racing heritage of Ferrari’s F40 and F50...

Celebrating the triumph of Enzo’s last years

The history behind Ferrari’s F40 and F50 cars is the history behind endurance racing itself; to tell the story of how Ferrari conceived of such a unique series of sports car that relied primarily on aerodynamics as opposed to brake horsepower is to tell the story of how some of the best automakers in the world, inside Italy or abroad, learned to rely on weight and wind resistance to build the best-performing car possible.

Actually, the F40 in particular could not have come at a better time; Enzo Ferrari himself was now 90-years-old and aware that he would soon be approaching the end of his life, and the auto company itself was now falling-short as far as their race track record was concerned. As his final testament to the automotive industry and the world, Mr. Ferrari wanted his last, commissioned supercar to be a monument of GT-racing that represented the apex of track performance associated with Ferrari, while creating a body and an aesthetic that would be representative of what the Ferrari engineers could do.

Introduced in 1987 as the successor to the 288 GTO, the F40 was the mid-motor, rear-drive model that became, at that time, Ferrari’s fastest and most expensive production car. Not only within the realm of all things Pininfarina, but Ferrari’s mid-motor F40 earned the titled, from 1987-89, as the fastest production car in the world, matched only by Porsche’s twin-turbo, 959, a car that was also built for the FIA racing series. Only 1,315 F40s were produced, with a retail price of around $400K, though some customers were rumored to have purchased units for up to $1.6 million, a considerable amount of money by late ‘80s/early ‘90s standards.

In the beginning, Ferrari had created the F40 on a rebound; where before Ferrari had dominated the Formula One circuit, even those victories were becoming few-and-far-between. Enzo Ferrari had predicted, beforehand, that the F40 would be the very last production sports car from the automaker that he himself would commission; Ferrari’s own prophecy would, of course, become a self-fulfilling one. But the actual development and production of the F40 car goes back as early as 1984, when the company’s Maranello factory began to construct an “evolution” model of the 288 GTO, a car that would race against Porsche’s 959 in FIA’s Group B category. This was until the 1986 racing season, when FIA eliminated the Group B category all-together. At that point, Enzo was left with five, 288 GTO Evoluzione cars with no racing class to enter them in. Though Enzo himself had died not long after, his last wish to reinforce a supercar legacy had enabled the Evoluzione car-building program to continue.

A race car by nature, the F40 was initially built and sold without traction control or several other amenities, including a sound system and interior carpet. Actually, F40s were originally sold without catalytic converters, until the U.S. made them mandatory in 1990 for emissions control. Though Ferrari’s primary focus with the F40 was not horsepower, but stability, the small, 2.9 liter V8 made most of its power through boost, the motor producing around 471 bhp under 16 pounds of boost. The F40 was also smart in design, as one of the engine’s exhaust pipes was designed to release excess gases from the cylinder banks, while a similar central pipe was designed to release gases from the twin turbos’ wastegate valves. Though 471 horsepower sounded relatively low in an Italian supercar, the 2400-pound, carbon and aluminum construction of the F40 body made it possible for the car to launch from 0-60 in 3.8 seconds, and the F40 would become the first production sports car to break the 200-mph barrier.

Similar in layout to the F40, the F50 was introduced in 1995 to celebrate Ferrari’s 50th anniversary. The history behind the F50 doesn’t seem to be as robust as the F40’s long-proven racing heritage, except that the F50, besides being an anniversary model, was also meant to be the successor to the F40. Another feature of the F50 that’s characteristic of the car is the evolutionary history behind its engine; the 4.7 liter, 60-valve V12 found in the F50 was a direct derivative of the 3.5 liter V12 found in the 1992, F92A formula car. Only 349 units were produced, one less car than Ferrari predicted they would sell; Ferrari reinforced rarity as an automotive aesthetic by going against the production numbers of the mainstreamed, automotive market.

Between the turbo-V8 construction of Ferrari’s F40 and the evolution of the F50’s V12 engine, Ferrari has managed, back then and in the present, to build a legacy, even when they were at the very bottom from a business-only standpoint.

- Sal Alaimo Jr., B. A. (6/14/11)

S. J. A.