The esplanade at the entrance to the 24 Hours of Le Mans circuit could not be better named: Place Luigi Chinetti. This Italian pilot, born in 1901 in Milan and became American in 1946, was the first winner of the event relaunched in 1949 after the repair of the Sarthe circuit, severely damaged by bombing during the Second World War – he had already won in 1932 and 1934 for Alfa Romeo. Chinetti also brought his first Le Mans success to Enzo Ferrari, former Alfa Romeo race director at the helm of his Scuderia, who created his own car brand two years earlier.
The 166 MM (for Mille Miglia) crewed by Luigi Chinetti-Peter Michel Thomson, 2nd Baron Selsdon, is only the third model to come out of the Maranello workshops; this barchetta is an evolution of the original Ferrari 125 with V12 engine increased to two liters of displacement and soon declined in GT road, first racing Ferrari truly adapted to the road. The beginning of a long legend… In 1949. Luigi Chinetti, a true marathoner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, will only give way to his Scottish teammate for less than two hours of driving! But the fact faded into history when, the following year, Louis Rosier imposed almost alone the Talbot Lago T26 Grand Sport shared with his son Jean-Louis… for only a couple of laps. And to think that Enzo Ferrari did not want, when he started racing, to hear about the 24 Hours of Le Mans for his cars! The 1949 166 MM was therefore a private and welcome engagement of the wealthy Lord Selsdon, by Chinetti’s sole will and for the glory of Ferrari.
At the age of 53, the Italian-American driver left the wheel then, in 1958, with the blessing of Enzo Ferrari this time, he created the North American Racing Team to prepare and enter his cars for a wealthy American clientele, to which he becomes a reputable importer. Under the colors white and blue, the famous Ferraris of N.A.R.T will participate, in turn, in the 24 Hours of Le Mans. A wink of fate, the stable of Luigi Chinetti will offer the Prancing Horse its ninth and last victory to date in the Sarthe (1965), with the mythical 250 LM 3.3 liters of Jochen Rindt and Masten Gregory (n ° 21) . It took a hat-trick of Italian cars to the finish, the NART ignoring the instructions of Ferrari’s sporting director to hunt down the 275 GTB of the Belgian team Francorchamps (Mairesse-Blaton) of Jacques Swaters.
In 1967, it was another NART car that completed a resounding 1-2-3 behind the official 330 P4s in the 24 Hours of Daytona; on American soil, the revenge on the hat-trick of the Ford GT40 MkII during Le Mans 66 was scathing and resounding to the sound of the V12s, tenors of mechanical bel canto on the Florida speed ring. The Le Mans adventure of the NART lasted until 1971, with the podium signed by the magnificent 512M prototype of the Americans Sam Posey and Tony Adamowicz.
What a long way since 1949! What triumphs accumulated, nine in sixteen years including six consecutive successes between 1961 and 1965! What legends are built! And a myth: the Ferrari 250, among the most expensive cars sold at auction… Ferrari enticed Henry Ford II to commit crazy sums to make the red cars bite the dust at Le Mans. Without the Ferraris, the GT40s probably wouldn’t have existed. Neither is the race of the century. Thirteen Americans, all “GT40” Mk I or II against as many Italians in 1966: 330 P3s and Spyders, 365 P2/P3s, 275 LMs and GTBs and even three small Dino 206s…
The finest of Formula 1 drivers were behind the wheel. In 1973, for the last participation of the official Ferraris of the Scuderia, Jacky Ickx, Brian Redman, Tim Schenken, Carlos Reutemann and Carlos Pace, Arturo Merzario who drove the 312 PB open prototypes against the blue Matra, were moreover these heirs of the glorious hero of the 250 prototypes, the golden age of the Scuderia. Belgian Olivier Gendebien was the first to score four wins at the 24 Hours (1958, 1960, 1961 and 1962; three times with F1 World Champion Phil Hill, once with journalist-driver Paul Frère). His 250 TR had a special feature: the cylinder head covers of the new 2-litre V12 engine were painted red, the car earning its nickname TestaRossa (red head). A Frenchman, Jean Guichet, associated with Nino Vaccarella also contributed to the victorious series (1964) on a 275P; its reduced and backfiring model then made the youngsters-apprentices of the Critérium du Jeune Pilote dream, equal to the Ford GT 40. Alongside this series of successes in the general classification, the 250 had a good lineage with the GTs and especially the GTO: Ferrari won in its category between 1959 and 1967 and even signed three GT quadruplets in 1959, 1960 and 1963 (six Ferraris in the first six places).
In 1974, Ferrari which, since its debut in the Formula 1 World Championship (1950), had maintained two factory programs in endurance and Grands Prix, concentrated on single-seaters to find there, from 1975 with Niki Lauda and Luca of Montezemolo, the success that had been fleeing the Italian team for several years. In Sarthe, however, private teams have perpetuated the tradition and excellence in their category, maintaining, in turn, certain models in a mythical dimension: the superb Daytona 365 GTB/4 4.4 liters from Ferrari Pozzi-France for example, 5th overall in 1972 and first GTS with Claude Ballot-Léna and Jean-Claude Andruet, again 6th in 1973 with Balllot-Léna and Vic Elford. The berlinettas of the GTE then extended the series of class victories (430, Modena, 458, 488 Italia…) and it is now towards the new Hypercar 499P with V6 biturbo, fifty years after the retirement of the 312PB prototypes of the engineer Mauro Forghieri, whom transalpine hopes are turning to once again resound on the podium with the catchy musical accents of Fratelli d’Italia, the national anthem.
