PAST MASTERS
Aston Martin brought back the DB4 and DB5. Jaguar resurrected the C-, D- and E-Types. Bentley’s building brand new Blowers. Might Ferrari build a line of 250 GTO or Dino continuations?
Not a chance. ‘It is fine to draw inspiration from the past but we cannot produce a restomod; this is low-level,’ design boss Flavio Manzoni told CAR at the reveal of the third Icona project, the Daytona SP3. Former CTO Michael Leiters echoed his sentiments: ‘This is a pure car but it is not nostalgic.’
And so the Icona series (for ‘icon’, and introduced with the ’50s-inspired SP1 and SP2 barchettas of 2018) is the closest Ferrari will get to plundering its surely peerless back catalogue. They’re new cars with heritage-inspired but not retro design, built in low volumes and with a design-first remit, giving Manzoni’s team greater freedom than is possible on mainstream Ferraris, which must prioritise high-performance packaging and supreme aero over sculpture.
The new Advanced Performance division over at Lotus has a broad remit. It’ll run from customer experiences and personalisation options on regular Lotus production cars right up to halo projects – ‘ultra-exclusive and unique vehicles’. Ferrari has been known to do the same, where clients have the required imagination and war chest. Maranello built 10 examples of the F40-inspired, 458-based J50 for the Japanese market, while the heart-rendingly beautiful GT3-based P80/C was a true one-off.
The closest thing to a Lotus Icona is the independent (but Lotus-blessed) Radford Type 62-2 (left): modern Lotus running gear; set-up and development work by Jenson Button, no less.
LOTUS RUNNING GEAR AND DEVELOPMENT WORK BY JENSON BUTTON, NO LESS
Two marques famous for two things: creating great driver’s cars, and being the most illustrious teams in F1 history. So it’s apposite that their most fêted drivers are two of the most supernaturally talented to have ever graced a racing car. And heartbreaking that both were fated to lose their lives at the height of their powers, at 32 years old.
A decade apart, Jim Clark and Gilles Villeneuve’s styles could not have been more different. Clark in a Lotus was super-smooth, capable of shattering a lap record while looking like he was barely trying, and could nurse a poorly car over the line with horse-whisperer mechanical sympathy. Villeneuve, saddled with cars which were not the Scuderia’s best against ground-effect missiles from Williams and Brabham, was rarely pointing in a straight line, with bravery and car control beyond mortal levels. Both enthralled crowds just the same.
And their team leaders, too.
Clark and Colin Chapman shared a close friendship; kinship, almost. Enzo Ferrari fondly christened Villeneuve his ‘prince of destruction’ in light of the ceaseless damage he did to his Grand Prix cars. He didn’t mind because he was trying, pushing harder than anyone else. Both lost their lives in tragic circumstances. Clark was due to race Ford’s F3L sports car but instead honoured a commitment to compete in an F2 race at Hockenheim. His car left the barrier-less forest circuit at speed for reasons still unknown, widely thought to have been a puncture. Driver error was unthinkable. Villeneuve, incensed by his team-mate ignoring team orders to overtake him at the gasp to win the previous race, was going for pole on a fully lit qualifying lap when he came across a backmarker on a slow-down lap; they went to move aside just as Villeneuve committed to passing them.
Clark and Villeneuve were already assured immortal legacies. The great unknown is what further heights they might have scaled.
VILLENEUVE COMMANDED BRAVERY AND CAR CONTROL BEYOND MORTAL LEVELS