You’d be hard pressed to find a Ferrari buff who doesn’t consider the 1962-1964 250 GT Berlinetta Lusso, a.k.a. 250 GT/L, one of the top five most beautiful Ferraris. Many consider it the most beautiful Ferrari ever, an automobile worthy of possessing for its stunningly elegant Pininfarina design alone.
It seemed like the perfect idea for the affluent auto enthusiast: a V12-powered GT combining supercar performance and room for four adults and their luggage. It would be a like a ground-bound private jet, as home on the Côte d’Azur as on the autostrada, autobahn or New York’s Long Island Expressway.
Naming a road car for a classic racecar would, for some marques, be a risky proposition. You probably won’t find too many objections, however, to Porsche’s putting the “718” badge on its redesigned Boxster and Cayman models.
The Continental R had the distinction of using a body not shared with a Rolls-Royce model. The basic idea for the big Bentley coupe had begun in 1985 with a concept model called Project 90. By then, Rolls had been steering Bentley back toward its performance roots with the Turbo sedan. A new coupe, based on that chassis, seemed the next logical step.
This past April, 25th-28th, the west coast’s tribute to the historic Mille Miglia wound its way though 1000 miles of California countryside. Now in its 26th year, the California Mille is a vintage road rally for cars that would have been eligible for the original Italian street race.
Why is Lamborghini turning back the clock with the rear-wheel drive Huracán LP 580-2? A simple answer might be to reduce weight (by 73 pounds) or price (by about $38,000), or to provide a more purist driving experience. The truth is all those, plus something else: to give this road rocket the joy of easily accessible oversteer.
The result of 50 years of collecting race cars and their consumer counterparts, Fred Simeone’s Museum is a celebration of the automobile. The museum is themed on the evolution of the racing sports car, showcasing the developments that never caught on as well as the icons that shaped the automotive world.
What Ferrari left out of the F40 made clear what kind of car it was. There was barely any sound insulation, and no radio. There weren’t even interior door handles; you reached into a recess in the door to pull a cable. Early cars had sliding Lexan side widows; later versions had hand-cranked roll-up windows.
With new 911 Carreras sporting turbochargers, the Porsche Club of America takes a look at the last 911 Turbo to be the only turbo 911.
