It doesn’t get much better than this.
Beautiful and a performance powerhouse, the Ferrari 250 GTO is on the wish list of many enthusiasts. If you don’t really understand why that is, the video below should help you gain a better appreciation for the car. It shows the car’s owner engaging in vigorous hill climbing for a blissful 7 minutes and 10 seconds while the V12 engine howls throughout the rpm range.
With a gated shifter and no power steering, this is unabashed, raw driving like most people don’t understand these days. To fully enjoy the performance heights of this Ferrari, the driver has to put in some decent work, but it’s more than worth the effort.
Many consider the Ferrari 250 GTO, which stands for Gran Turismo Omologato, to be one of the best-looking cars ever made. It helped really cement the Ferrari reputation back in the 1960s, despite production from 1962 to 1964 being a mere 39 cars. That kind of historical significance paired up with a low production run means today 250 GTOs will sell for millions.
What you hear in the video is a 3.0-liter V12 with six twin-throat Weber 38DCN carburetors. It was a big improvement over what the Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta used, with peak performance officially stated at 300-horsepower. For the 1960s this was one fast car, and it’s obviously still a thrilling ride today. As you can clearly see in the video, this Ferrari has no problem sticking the sweeping turns and accelerating up this mountain pass.
Most people today don’t realize that wonderfully fluid body was created primarily not for looks but instead to minimize aerodynamic drag. The SWB Berlinetta models struggled when they tried pushing beyond 155 mph, thanks to a blunt nose on the car. This design is longer and has a narrow, more sculpted front fascia which allows the wind to flow over it. Sergio Scaglietti was responsible for the design innovation and he used a wind tunnel extensively for the project. What we get is a beautiful and highly functional machine capable of hitting 170 mph, or being able to hold its own on a tough hill climb.
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Image credit: YouTube
