Sweet music at the Downs

The 2014 New Zealand Festival of Motor Racing celebrating Ferrari has secured a third Formula One racer from the marque for the event which runs over two weekends next January.

The car – a 1994 ex-Gerhard Berger and Jean Alesi 412T1 – has a 3.5 litre V12 normally aspirated engine, and is regarded as one of the best sounding Formula One cars of all time.

The car will be running fast demonstration laps over both January 17-20 and January 24–26 weekends at the Ferrari Festival. It was the second-to-last of six 412T1 chassis and was used from the Canadian Grand Prix onwards. It was driven by Jean Alesi to third place at the Canadian Grand Prix, and to second place at the British Grand Prix. Team-mate Gerhard Berger used it to finish second at the season-closing Australian Grand Prix on the Adelaide circuit.

The 412T1, with a development 75-degree V12 placed into it, was a competitive and good-handling proposition on all but the tightest of circuits. What it lacked was the mechanical reliability required for a serious assault on the World Championship title.

There’s no questioning the car’s historical significance, however. It was the Ferrari F1 team’s second-most used chassis during the turbulent and tragic 1994 F1 season. Michael Schumacher won his first F1 title in a Benetton-Ford F1 but the entire season was overshadowed by a string of serious accidents and the deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger at the San Marino Grand Prix in May at Imola.

This chassis – 154 – has been brought to New Zealand by a group of enthusiasts led by Christchurch’s Steve Webber and is the third Ferrari Formula One car to be confirmed for the 2014 New Zealand Festival of Motor Racing. Two 1985 turbocharged 156 cars will also be running at the event.

“This will be the first public running in New Zealand of an iconic V12 Ferrari Formula One car,” says Festival Chairman Jim Barclay. “It’s iconic for many reasons given that it was the Scuderia’s car for 1994, but the design took a race win as well as carrying Gerhard Berger to third in the drivers’ championship and Alesi to fifth. The musical V12 engine will be reason alone to come along to look and listen.”

Tickets for the event are available at www.nzfmr.co.nz