Ferrari 250 GTO – Chassis #3387GT

The Ferrari 250 GTO was built for a single purpose: to win the FIA World Championship of Makes for Gran Turismo cars. Enzo Ferrari needed a minimum of 100 units for homologation. He built 36. The FIA accepted the car on the basis that it was an evolution of the 250 GT, not a new model — a creative interpretation of the rules that has become one of the most famous episodes in the history of motorsport regulation. The GTO designation stands for Gran Turismo Omologato: Grand Touring, Homologated.

Chassis #3387GT was the second Ferrari 250 GTO completed at Maranello. It was hand-finished in March 1962 and delivered to Luigi Chinetti — the Italian-American driver, dealer, and founder of the North American Racing Team (NART) who had won the 24 Hours of Le Mans three times and was responsible for importing Ferrari to the United States. The car was originally finished in Blu Genziana with a white central stripe, a colour combination specific to NART entries. Ferrari sold it to Chinetti for $9,700.

On 24 March 1962, chassis #3387GT became the first Ferrari 250 GTO to race. Entered at the 12 Hours of Sebring as a NART car, it was driven by Phil Hill — the reigning Formula One World Champion — and Olivier Gendebien. They finished second overall and first in the GT class. The car returned to Maranello for preparation and was then entered at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June 1962, driven by Bob Grossman and George Roberts Jr. It finished sixth overall and third in class. Grossman continued to race the car through 1962 and into 1963, accumulating 27 races and 16 podium finishes.

The car’s subsequent history is as extraordinary as its racing career. In 1964, Mike Gammino crashed it during practice for the Daytona 2000 when a wheel collapsed on the banking. The rear frame and body were rebuilt by Vaccarri in Modena. In the 1970s, a new aluminium body was fabricated during a restoration in California. In 1989, the car was stolen by six men from the Savannah area — the mastermind was a motorcycle dealer who faxed potential buyers on his own fax machine. The FBI recovered the car the same day. In 2017, chassis #3387GT sold privately for $44 million, making it one of the most expensive cars ever traded.

The Ferrari 250 GTO is powered by a Colombo V12 engine — the Tipo 168/62 Comp — displacing 2,953 cc with six Weber 38 DCN carburettors, producing approximately 300 horsepower. The body was designed by Giotto Bizzarrini and Sergio Scaglietti, with wind tunnel testing at the University of Pisa under Bizzarrini’s direction. The result was a shape so aerodynamically efficient and so visually coherent that the Ferrari 250 GTO has been recognised as a work of art — literally. Chassis #3387GT was exhibited at the Frist Art Museum in Nashville in 2016 as part of a Ferrari exhibition.

This photograph captures chassis #3387GT at golden hour. The Blu Genziana bodywork — the original NART colour — catches the last light of the day. The composition is low, placing the viewer at the level of the car’s shoulder line, where the Kamm tail, the wire-spoke Borrani wheels, and the hand-hammered aluminium curves are visible exactly as they were when the car left Maranello sixty years ago.