FERRARI 365GTB/4 DAYTONA
Year of manufacture 1973 Recorded mileage 35,587 Asking price £550,000 Vendor Talacrest, Warfield, Berkshire; 01344 308178; talacrest.com
WHEN IT WAS NEW Price £8938.60 Max power 352bhp Max torque 318lb ft 0-60mph 5.4 secs Top speed 174mph Mpg 12
Here in the UK, we were lucky to be blessed with a lot of warmth and sunshine in 2022. Not so now, with the short hours of daylight and low temperatures getting me down, so this month I’ve selected something in serious dream-car territory that has me planning sunkissed road trips.
It would seem that I’m not the only one to have their imagination captured by this Ferrari. “The owner painted it this colour because it was his favourite spec – and it’s mine, too,” says John Collins of vendor Talacrest. “This is what attracted me to it. It is the first Daytona I have bought for stock in 25 years.” The Blu Chiaro paint is a handsome shade, bringing out the best of the 365GTB/4’S lines, penned by Leonardo Fioravanti when at Pininfarina, and it’s a colour that sits well with the Pelle Beige leather upholstery. When it left the factory it was Marrone Dino Metallizzato, a deep bronze/brown to which I am also rather partial, but its current blue hue is still very becoming.
This example is one of just 158 right-hand-drive cars built, and it was invoiced to British distributor Maranello Concessionaires on 25 June 1973. The following month its first owner bought it for £8938.60 via Sytner of Mapperley, Nottingham. Its second keeper’s tenure began in 1975 and it remained in the care of that family until 1989. It then went to auction in the suitably glamorous Monaco, having done a mere 7968 miles – at the time, the family said the Ferrari had been ‘well stored, regularly maintained and started every two months’. Collector Gerald Carroll was the winning bidder, and he had the car restored before selling it to historic racing driver Jonathan Baker. It achieved concours glory with its next owner, between 2003 and 2005, before being campaigned on rallies by a further custodian.
As well as having Ferrari Classiche certification, chassis 16711’s history file is full of invoices and receipts from marque specialists, plus it received a bare-metal respray in 2014, and it still has its matching-numbers gearbox and engine. John says it “must be one of the very best Ferrari Daytonas available today”, and it is hard to disagree.
Of course, the all-alloy, quad-cam V12 won’t be cheap to fuel at 12mpg, but that’s not the point. It will sound mighty, while its classic, long-bonnet GT style helps make it a comfortable and, relatively speaking, practical companion in which to get away from it all.