Sold: $918,500

1964 was an important year for Ferrari. John Surtees became Formula 1 World Champion in a Ferrari 158 and the team won the Formula 1 Constructors Championship, the International GT Constructors Championship and the International Speed and Endurance Challenge. Racing improves the breed and Ferraris incredible success would heavily influence its latest production models.

Unveiled at the Paris Salon in October 1964 Ferraris new berlinetta, the 275 GTB was an evolution of the preceding 250 GT cars such as the 250 GT Lusso. The 275 GTB was launched alongside its sister car, a spyder, which shared the same chassis and engine, the 275 GTS.

The aggressive styling of the 275 GTB was quite similar to that of Ferraris GTO and was regarded as being among the purest and most beautiful of any Ferrari built. Pininfarina had created a true, timeless classic of sports car design which was beautifully executed by Scaglietti.

In October 1966 at the Paris Salon, Ferrari introduced the next evolution of the 275 GTB, the 275 GTB/4. Other than an increase in track by 24 mm, the chassis was unchanged. Outwardly the new car was the same other than a full-length bulge down the bonnet to clear the six downdraft Webers.

The change in model designation simply reflected the single substantial difference between the GTB/4 and its predecessor; the V12 engine was fitted with four overhead camshafts, two per cylinder bank. This revised powerplant, known as Tipo 226, was directly derived from the 3.3 and 4-liter engines which powered the 275 and 330 P2 prototypes of the 1965 racing season. With remarkable mid-range torque and flexibility, this formidable engine was capable of propelling the new 275 GTB/4 to a top speed of 160 miles per hour. Competition power levels had been made available to Ferraris clients right off the showroom floor.

With its rear-mounted trans-axle, Ferrari had produced a car with perfect weight distribution that handled superbly. Perhaps one of the best summations of the GTB/4s driving manners and performance abilities came from Grand Prix winning, French racing driver, Jean-Pierre Beltoise. In a road test published in 1967 in LAuto Journal he said, I covered in complete safety and the greatest comfort& and while carrying on a normal conversation with my passenger, the 46 miles which separate the Ponte dOrléans from Nemours and this was completed in a little less than 23 minutes&at an average speed of more than 121 mph  which is remarkable enough without noting that I had to stop for the toll gates. The 275 GTB/4 Berlinetta is, first and foremost, a serious and comfortable gran turismo, but it retains the lineage of a race car in the response of the engine and the quality of the handling. In my opinion, the 275 GTB/4 is one of the greatest automobiles created in our times.

275 GTB/4, Chassis # 10045  Star of Stage, Screen and Speedvision
In the late 1990s Speedvision featured a popular automobile restoration series called Dream Car Garage. Essentially the program focused the spotlight on a total restoration of a feature car  Episode One would show the original car, prior to disassembly with the last depicting the completely restored car roaring into the sunset, or in the case of this Ferrari  roaring off the auction block! All of the Dream Car Garage Speedvision program segments which detail this cars restoration will accompany the sale of the car to its new owner.As the television film footage shows, # 10045 was at that time a red/black original, matching numbers, low mileage California car  almost too nice to restore, according to Peter Klutt, the principal of Legendary Motorcars, the restoration firm contracted for the rebuild and film production. Take the body, for instance. A strip to bare metal revealed a perfect, never-rusted or accident-damaged shell which had only had one re-paint from the original Factory silver to red, sometime in the late 1980s.

Prior to this, the Marcel Massini database shows that our four-cam was delivered new to Ferrari dealers Martinelli & Sonico of Lugano, Switzerland in 1967. Shortly after that, it was exported from Switzerland to the U.S.A. with the first American owner listed as L.D. Alderman of Maryland. In 1973 Francois Sicard carried out major work for an unknown owner. In January, 1973 it was bank-owned prior to going to a Robert Neudeck of New York, NY with the odometer showing 18,000 kilometers. Neudeck apparently liked this four-cam, owning it for over 20 years and putting some 15,000 further kilometers on the clock.In the summer of 1997 it was advertised for sale in the Ferrari Market Letter by Mike Sheehan on behalf of one owner for the past 22 years. Chris Cox of Prova International became the next owner prior to its ground-up restoration by Legendary Motorcars of Milton, Ontario, Canada as part of the Dream Car Garage series. After the restoration, Legendary consigned it to RMs Classic Cars of Toronto Spring auction where it was purchased by the aforementioned Skip Barber.

While most of the cars in the Barber Collection can be shown on a national level, all of them are of a turn-key driver quality as well. As an ex-racing driver of note, Barbers performance car conduct centers upon three criteria  engine performance and in particular, throttle response, handling and for a sports car, this means cornering, and last but not least, braking ability. While the cars fresh restoration could not be faulted in terms of its aesthetics and fit and finishes, Skip Barber felt that a bit of additional mechanical work would make it a perfect driver.The engine, for example, had been disassembled and inspected but not deemed ready for a full rebuild during the previous restoration and consequently exhibited the blue smoke syndrome of any Factory Ferrari on its original valve seals. The solution  a total engine-out, rebuild by Bill Pollards SportAuto, when a set of modern valve guide seals would have sufficed, may seem like overkill but hey, thats what car guys do! Major suspension work by AutoSport in Sharon, CT in the areas of spring rates, shock settings, sway bar adjustments and wheel alignment took care of Skip Barbers handling concerns. The end result of all this work is a fly-yellow Ferrari 275 GTB/4 which runs as well as it looks, admittedly a cliché, but one that best describes this particular example.