What a $1.87-million car looks like
This rare Ferrari sports car classic sold at auction for almost $2-million. Enjoy the pictures, and consider our suggestions for three other ways to spend that cash
1951 Ferrari 212 Cabriolet One of the Italian marque's earliest sports cars, this open two-seater was created alongside Ferrari's soon-to-be legendary Grand Prix cars and Le Mans racers in its Modena factory.
After his racing career ended, Enzo Ferrari founded a company in 1947 to build the racing cars that he loved. Soon realizing that he would need to support his true passion of racing with the sale of street cars, he sold about 600 cars in his company's first decade.Pawel Litwinski/Gooding and Co.
Ferrari was known as an engine guy and wasn't interested in spending design time and effort on chassis and bodywork. This resulted in impressive V-12 engines that became the company's trademark being fitted into cars that were often somewhat rudimentary by contemporary standards in terms of chassis, suspension, gearboxes and brakes. The 212 Export's engine, the work of famed ingenere Gioacchino Columbo, is an all-alloy, 2.5-litre, single-overhead-cam V-12 which produces 155 hp at 6,500 rpm, fed to the rear wheels by a five-speed gearbox. Racing models made about 175 hp., good for about 225 km/h and got to 100 km/h in about seven seconds.
Gioacchino Columbo's superb V-12 was fitted into a simple tube chassis with independent front suspension, a live-axle at the back and drum brakes all round. Ferrari's mechanics bolted all this together in June of 1951 and shipped it to the Vignale studio in Turin, where Alfredo Vignale created the styling and his artisans performed their metal magic to form its wonderfully curvaceous bodywork. It was one of just two originally given cabriolet bodywork.
Or if you prefer something larger, for $1.87-million you could purchase approximately 18 Cadillac Escalade SUVs (depending on model and options selected).
A sports car enthusiast with $1.87-million to burn could purchase 25 BMW Z4 sDrive 35i Roadsters, complete with 6-speed manual transmissions, 3.0-litre 300 hp engines and more technical gadgets than Mr. Ferrari could have imagined.