PAT HOARE’S FERRARI

Your article on the Hoare Ferrari ( NZ Classic Driver #101, May/June 2022) brought back memories. I saw it racing at Ardmore as a single-seater and then in 1994 I attended the John Surtees 60th birthday celebration at Brands Hatch. One of the historic grand prix cars there included the Ferrari, still in V12 guise. John Surtees came onto the PA system and suggested that he was probably the only person there who had seen this car in this guise in ‘real’ racing as he competed against it. He was wrong – I also had seen it racing!

I lived just down the road from Logan Fow and I remember that prior to the Ferrari he had owned a Mistral. Coincidentally there was for a time another Mistral being built between our house and Logan’s and I did get to see it under construction. Two Mistrals in the same neighbourhood was not exactly common!

I was Clerk of the Course for Hamilton Car Club straight sprints on the Bruntwood straight and I remember Logan turning up with the Ferrari. Unfortunately, it could never pass scrutineering for any form of competition as the fuel filler was inside the cabin and this was deemed unsafe. However, who could turn down a Ferrari at a club event? He was allowed to do a demonstration run but promptly cooked the clutch. Next year he arrived again, this time with a driver in tow – none other than Jim Palmer. Jim did a couple of demonstration runs but I do not remember any times.

Anecdotally we always believed that Logan was never paid for the Ferrari, and we always thought that some shyster had shafted him. The real story as described by Allan Dick fits with what the gossip and the distortion that came with it said. Yes, he was not ‘paid’ but there was no shyster. Logan was never an active member of the club and after the Ferrari he ‘disappeared’ and went kite flying so the story was never debunked to my knowledge.

PS: I was watching on YouTube the Monaco Historic race meeting held recently. The race for front-engined Grand Prix cars built before 1961 was won by a Ferrari Dino 246. The announcers said, no doubt taken from the owner’s notes, that this was the car that Phil Hill drove in the 1960 season. It therefore is highly likely that this is the Pat Hoare Ferrari, now restored to its original 2.5-litre V6 guise. What a postscript to your article!

Allan Gough, via email

[Thanks for the memories Allan, and for the very appropriate postscript. AGW]