We all know that famous story by now .. how Henry Ford II had made a deal with Enzo Ferrari to buy the Ferrari brand after Ferrari had won consecutive Le Mans from ’62 to ’65.
The deal was on the table. It was done!
But at the last minute, Enzo turned and walked away, leaving Henry fuming at the prospect of not being able to put together the deal that he wanted so badly to elevate Ford’s racing prospects.
Henry was so angry in fact, that he channelled all the rage and all the energy into a determination to beat Ferrari at Le Mans!
After a few false starts, he finally engaged Caroll Shelby in ’64 and the rest as they say, is history.
Shelby’s engineering, teamed with Ford’s aerodynamic body design and tank tough chassis of the GT-40 proved too strong a combination for Ferrari, and Henry Ford II got his wish by 1966 – to beat the Ferrari’s and also to have developed a respectable racing future for Ford Motor Company.
In fact, just to prove the point, the wins continued in ’67, then also in ’68 and one more time in ’69 to leave the Shelby engineered Ford GT-40 undefeated at Le Mans.
This particular car, was the prototype GT-40 that helped that evolution towards the Le Mans circuit. In fact this car was on it’s maiden race with the Ford program when it gave Shelby his first taste of podium, with Ken Miles and Lloyd Ruby taking the Shelby American Ford GT to victory in the Daytona 2000 in February 1965.
Now you know why it’s worth 7 Million American Dollars!!
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