Ferrari at the Table
The troubles of sports-car racing's past are behind
us, right?
Maybe not: Peter Brock looks at an American
team's frustrating foray into the world of big-time
European motorsports.
The old white-haired waiter at the sidewalk cafe stood quietly
next to my small table. He'd seen the sports pages opened to the incredulous events of the previous day, and now looked at my media credentials and camera. It was late on a Tuesday morning in June, just five days before the race at Le Mans.
"Will the Ferrari run?" he asked, expecting me to have the answer no one knew.
I shrugged. "They can't even get through tech."
"Well, if the Ferrari runs," he said, looking at the headlines and the picture of the yellow car in
the newspaper once more, "I will go to sit again just past that long row of tall trees near Terte Rouge - do
you know the place?"
"Yes," I replied. I knew it well.
"I haven't been for years," he continued. "It's not the same - always
the Porsches, the Porsches. But if Ferrari runs again this year, I will go in the
evening just to listen." He paused a long time, and stared into the past. "At night,"
he finally returned, "the sound of the Ferrari, it comes with the lights. And it
goes so high that I think it's not possible. No one remembers anymore. It's not
the same now." His wire-rimmed glasses reflected the light so I couldn't see
his eyes, but I knew they were closed.
It was true. It wasn't the same. The sound of a V12 Ferrari prototype hadn't been heard at Le
Mans for more than 20 years, since the days when the silver-haired
Ingeniere himself ran the factory with an autocratic hand. The reasons for the red cars' absence were varied, but among them was the Italian
factory's belief that the rules at Le Mans have long favored the small-displacement, turbocharged prototypes
of their French and German enemies.
As a result of these and other ill-considered regulations, Le Mans has suffered. Just three
years ago, interest in prototype and GT racing had waned so much that the once-mighty 24 Hours could
not even fill its entry grid. But then the situation changed: In 1992, the independent-minded race directors
at the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) decided to break with their former overlords at the FIA,
rewrite the race's rules and try to attract a broad, international group of cars. Each year since, the field has
grown, until this summer the ACO was besieged with 99 entries for the 48 starting places. Literally half
the entrants would be winnowed out through pre-race trails before the remainder - along with a few
special "provisional entrants" who were not required to prequalifycould start showing up for tech the
Monday before the race.
Among the provisional entries were two Ferrari 333SPs owned by Indianapolis,
Indiana's Euromotorsport team. They'd be the first Ferrari prototypes at Le Mans in more than 20 years.
While the ACO's grant of provisional status didn't guarantee the Ferraris would start, at least
the American team wouldn't have to come to France two months early to officially test and pre-qualify.
But on the same late-April weekend that their rivals were trying to earn a qualifying berth at Le Mans, one
of Euromotorsport's two 333SPs was effectively destroyed in a racing crash at Road Atlanta in
Georgia. Disquiet within the team quickly followed, and several of the regular employees, concerned about
IMSA's safety situation, departed Euro-motorsport to find better paying, less stressful jobs elsewhere. Team
manager/ owner Antonio Ferrari (no relation to Enzo) and crew chief Sean Coggin then had to build a
pickup crew for Le Mans, and it was this group that eventually realized that two chassis could not be prepared
in time for the 24-hour. As a result, the team arrived in France already tired from weeks of hard work
and altered strategies.
Worse still, they stepped directly into the path of a political maelstrom between the Ferrari
factory in Italy, the imperious French ACO and their own troubled American sanctioning body, IMSA. At
first they were frustrated, then they became angry and eventually just disgusted. On arriving in
France, Euromotorsport's scheduled practice and development sessions were quickly dissolved in an acid-bath
of dissension.
To create the ACO's new regulations, Le Mans' technical director, Alain Bertaut, devised a
pragmatic solution in 1992 that recognized motor-racing as an entertainment, not a technical exercise. In
an effort to attract as many topline competitors from around the world as possible, Bertaut rewrote the
rules to accommodate cars from as many other sanctioning bodies as he could, including those from IMSA
and the BPR - the ACO's main rivals for sports car-racing primacy. To do this, he created a
complicated equivalency formula suitable only for Le Mans. It would even out the performance of a diverse field
of machinery originally built to widely differing sets of rules.
Of course, in trying to equalize everything from big V12s to tiny Porsche and Peugeot
turbos, American V8s and even Mazda rotaries, keeping the racing both fair and safe soon dictated a
highly complex rulebook. Among many other things, Bertaut decided to nullify the V12s' high-rpm power
advantage by limiting their revs, to control the turbos via intake-mounted air restrictors and to balance
out other advantages of layout, performance and construction with a complex formula regulating
variables such as wheel/tire size and maximum fuel tank capacity. Amazingly, in the last few years,
Bertaut's equivalency formula has evolved into a fairly equitable and widely acceptable formula: This year only
40 seconds per lap separated the fastest and slowest cars on the 8.4-mile circuit. Considering the vagaries
of weather and strategy, it could have been anybody's race.
But fair and successful equivalency formulas are difficult to write, harder still to enforce
and virtually impossible to maintain. Racing is all about searching for advantages, and an impasse
at scrutineering is sure to result when a competitor is found to have succeeded where the rulebook itself
has failed. Then, under the chief steward's guidance, the technical directors must decide if they can
rightfully disallow an innovation or interpretation even though it seems to conform to the letter of the rules. It's
a very difficult situation, because ultimately it comes down to the director's own subjective interpretation of the rules. Worse still, absolute objectivity is often lost in these confrontations when cultural differences or past political history hangs in the air.
Le Mans' tech inspectors are legendary for their seemingly capricious decisions, but great
strides have undeniably been made in recent years to add a new fairness and objectivity to their rulings.
The highly detailed rules are even written in several languages for the benefit of those who don't speak
French, and copies of these are sent out months in advance and constantly updated with airmailed revisions
and official interpretations.
But with their added complexity, of course, inevitably comes added confusion and perceived
loopholes. The most important rule to understand at Le Mans is that in case of a dispute, only the French interpretation will prevail - in other words, the ACO believes the entrants themselves are responsible
for identifying rules they don't understand and seeking clarifications.
The intricate negotiations to enter a works-built 333SP at Le Mans actually started quietly back
in February at the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona. A casual meeting between the Ferrari's owner/entrants
and the official observers sent from Le Mans indicated a high level of interest from both parties.
This was a rather delicate matter, as the Ferrari factory had already decided they wouldn't
enter, endorse or support a Le Mans entry, desiring instead to concentrate on Formula One. With the sale of
each 333SP came a gentleman's agreement not to run them anywhere but in the American IMSA events.
Rules differences between IMSA and the ACO, along with the unique conditions of the French race itself,
meant that preparing a car for Le Mans would be a difficult and costly endeavor. The factory didn't want to
be embarrassed by a poorly prepared car, but they simultaneously didn't have the resources to ready a
serious campaign themselves.
They were also, of course, well aware of the tremendous sponsorship windfall that could accompany the first Ferrari prototype to return to Le Mans. Rather than letting this go to a privateer, the
factory felt it was their right to tap this resource if and when they chose to. Several other 333SP owners had
also considered running Le Mans '95, but in the end pressure from the factory - or perhaps just common
sense - prevailed.
Euromotorsport's Italian manager/owner Antonio Ferrari knew all of this, but he and the
Italian co-owners of the 333SPs, Massimo Sigala and Massimo Sordi, had their own dream to consider.
Besides, the 35-year-old manager thought, he was probably more qualified than most to run the factory's car
in France. He'd been a staff engineer in Maranello several years earlier working primarily on aerodynamic development, and could recognize a window of technical opportunity that might be closed by the time the factory decided to act. Antonio Ferrari also knew one other thing: In the hope of luring IMSA
WSC prototypes to Le Mans, the ACO had agreed to waive a significant number of their usual prototype regulations in the case of active IMSA WSC cars. Thus, while the 333SP would still have to contend with lower-octane Elf pump fuel than the Exxon racing gas it was made for and submit to the ACO's V12-punishing rev limit, there remained some freedoms in body shape and construction that might give the American- owned Ferrari an advantage over its European competitors.
The lower octane fuel would require a reduction in compression, a new ignition curve, new camshafts and a totally new fuel map for the engine management system. These were all tasks the factory would be loathe to assume, but perhaps a way could be found if the Euromotorsport team played its cards right. Next, Bertaut's complex equivalency formula mandated an rpm limit of 10,500, while the 4-liter V12 itself could reportedly run safely up to 13,000. This wasn't as big a problem as it seemed,
since Euromotorsport had already tested a 10,500 rev limit at Daytona, which allowed the Ferrari to run at a lower weight limit than its rivals. Antonio Ferrari already knew that while the rev limit would lower the 333SP's speed, it would also improve its reliability - basically a wash.
And where Antonio Ferrari felt he held the real ace was his knowledge of aerodynamics. Even
if the Ferrari's power was seriously compromised, his computer models showed a new
minimum-downforce, low-drag shape might still make it the fast-est car at Le Mans.
With backing from Sigala and Sordi, Antonio formally contacted the ACO in early April. Upon receiving a positive response, a meeting between Antonio Ferrari and Le Mans directors Jean Pierre Moreau and Alain Bertaut was arranged at the Paris offices of Gil Gagniault, the French distributor for Ferrari cars. Because of this unique intermediary position between the factory and the French,
Gagniault would be designated by Antonio Ferrari as the team's official contact with the ACO. The Frenchman thus became an important - but sometimes confusing - center of the action.
Hoping to avoid as many problems as possible, Antonio Ferrari presented some 20 pages of specific questions at this meeting covering many of the subtle differences between the IMSA and ACO regulations. Antonio Ferrari also brought a letter and affidavit from Mark Raffauf, the vice president of IMSA, stating that Euro-motorsport's chassis complied with all IMSA rules and that one of their cars had competed at Sebring and Daytona.
Antonio Ferrari and Massimo Sigala were granted two of the coveted provisional entry slots and, underscoring the promotional value of their attendance, assigned the numbers 1 and 2. Antonio Ferrari was also told that any further questions regarding his entry would be faxed directly from the ACO within three days.
An ecstatic Ferrari went back to the US with serious plans for Le Mans, but his jubilance would prove short-lived indeed. On the very next day, Gil Gagniault made an unauthorized announcement to the French media that inferred factory involvement:
"Ferrari is returning to Le Mans!"
While Gagniault's impetuous move shed a favorable light on his own French distributorship, it took his American and Italian associates completely by surprise - and sat predictably badly with both. Ferrari S.p.A. president Luca Montezemolo and factory chairman Piero Lardi Ferrari were particularly upset; whatever happened, they realized, it was probably going to be difficult for Maranello. If the factory didn't support this effort and Euromotorsport did poorly, Ferrari would look churlish. If they refused
to help and their ex-engineer won, they'd look like fools. And if they did pitch in, not only would their own Formula One effort suffer but the underdeveloped car had a high probability of failure regardless.
Worrying wouldn't help, however. The Maranello factory was contractually responsible for the engines and technical development of the 333SP during the '95 season, and like it or not their reputation was now at stake.
The manufacturer decided to take a responsible middle course; they would co-operate enough
to give the American team a fighting chance, at least within the limits of the factory's resources and
obligations. But they wouldn't do so happily.
At the Paris meeting, Gagniault arranged to have several hundred gallons of the specified Elf pump fuel shipped to Maranello for the recalibration of the Le Mans-spec engines. But after that fact, the history gets a bit hazy depending on who's talking. Evidently, Bertaut and the ACO's technical committee still had some questions regarding the Ferrari's Magnetti/Marelli rev limiter and on-board data acquisition system. The ACO didn't have a technical agreement with Magnetti-Marelli, but they still had to figure out a way to monitor the Ferrari's revs during the race. Specifically, Daniel Perdrix, Le Mans' chief of tech, wanted technical details on the 333SP's data-recorder system and a rev-limiter calibrated
to French standards.
Bertaut says a fax to this regard was sent to Gagniault, the entrant's officially designated contact. But Antonio Ferrari says this fax was never received in Indianapolis - and, when queried, Gagniault only answers, "Who wants to know?" Even so, Antonio Ferrari continues, he was trying to keep ahead of the game. Knowing the Italian rev limiter was an unknown quantity to the ACO, he contacted IMSA to get the electronic code for the device, thinking it could be passed to the ACO for that exact purpose. According to Antonio Ferrari, however, IMSA refused the request, saying it would not divulge "proprietary technical information" - this despite a very public promise to co-operate with the ACO, which had graciously offered to admit IMSA cars into the 24-hour race.
And even with their international détente, the ACO's relaxed rules for IMSA cars still required fairly extensive changes to the 333SP's 4-liter V12. This duty fell, unannounced, on the factory in Maranello. Had Gagniault not made his impetuous speech to the press, perhaps Euromotorsport would have been able to cajole the factory into lowering its resistance, but the deed was now done. Thus two "Le Mans"
engines were prepared at Maranello and sent back to Indianapolis, but the disaffected factory refused to tell the American team exactly what had been done to them. Even tuning specs and dyno sheets were withheld, no doubt a not-so-subtle comment on Maranello's opinion of privateers who defy the factory's dictates.
Of course Maranello had other reasons to snub Antonio Ferrari as well. His cars were running - and winning - on Goodyears instead of the factory-preferred Pirellis, and Euromotorsport had been buying spares directly from 333SP-constructor Dallara Engineering, not the official Ferrari parts channels. Euromotorsport had definitely made a faster Ferrari, but they had also made themselves unpopular
in Modena. Still, while all may have not been sweetness and light, the job did get done; Ferrari is, and always has been, a racing entity first and foremost.
In mid-June, Antonio Ferrari made arrangements with a Chicago air-freight forwarder to ship the 333SP to Paris. He then left for France to make final arrangements for his local support crew at Le Mans. On the appointed morning, the French press, the ACO and Antonio Ferrari all eagerly awaited the arrival of the first Ferrari prototype to race at Le Mans in a generation.
But there was one small problem: The Ferrari didn't show!
Faxes and telephone calls blasted from Paris to Chicago:
"Where was the car?" The forwarder didn't know, the French airline officials didn't know, and Antonio Ferrari couldn't tell the ACO that he didn't know. Euromotorsport's million-dollar entry was just plain lost.
This, of course, immediately raised the ACO's suspicions. How - or why - could anyone "lose" a million-dollar racecar? There had to be some reason the car was "misplaced" - perhaps to rush its eventual tech inspection in the hope of slipping some devious illegal device by the officials? Antonio Ferrari had dark suspicions of his own - suspicions of a French plot to delay or even disqualify his car before
it reached Le Mans - so he made no attempt to update the ACO officials on his dilemma. Besides, in Italy the team manager is supposed to know where his car is.
Strong international tension and intrigue therefore surrounded the entry from the start, and perhaps it was inevitable that bad blood would result. When the car still hadn't appeared a day later, all parties had become exceedingly upset - Ferrari because he was losing precious test time (and face), and the French because their star attraction seemed to be avoiding the issue. Instead of co-operation, there was mutual distrust.
When the car finally did turn up, the French paparazzi - who had been waiting at the airport for days - found it first and had pictures of the racecar in the morning papers before Antonio Ferrari or the ACO had even been apprised of its arrival! Perhaps not surprisingly, by the time the pale-yellow 333SP finally arrived for tech at the Place de Jacobins in downtown Le Mans, both sides were firmly convinced its disappearance was arranged by the other.
Of course there was an immediate problem: Since Perdrix had not been informed of the car's arrival, he was not there to tell his staff inspectors of the ACO's waiver to IMSA cars. According to the French inspectors, the entry was "completely illegal" under the ACO's rules for WSC/LM cars.
The Ferrari team manager patiently explained, through interpreter Gil Gagniault, that the conflicting equipment had already been waived in under the ACO's own "IMSA exclusion rule," which was intended to broaden Le Mans' entry field by allowing IMSA's WSC cars into the race with minor modifications. Antonio Ferrari also pointed out that his entry had been personally approved by Moreau and Bertaut, and that his car was certified as WSC-legal by Mark Raffauf, the president of IMSA. The official letter of certification was then produced, verifying the agreement between the ACO and IMSA. En garde!
But to Antonio Ferrari's amazement, the French officials were wholly unimpressed. They pointed out that Raffauf's letter stated he would personally be at tech to certify the car's legality - but, delayed by IMSA's at-home legal matters, Raffauf hadn't shown. The inspectors themselves were not versed in IMSA regulations, and indeed, since IMSA had agreed to come to France and vouch for its entrants, there was
no reason they should be. Without Raffauf's personal endorsement, they could not be sure the car was WSC-legal, or even that it was the machine listed in the papers. Therefore it had to conform to the ACO's prototype rules, which it obviously did not.
To even qualify for practice, the inspectors demanded several modifications be made immediately. The first was providing the ACO with some acceptable method of engine-speed monitoring. Antonio Ferrari countered that the car already had a 10,500-rpm rev limiter and monitoring system, one that had been checked and certified by the ACO's supposed partners at IMSA. But the inspectors had no way to verify this, and again would not accept an IMSA-approved part without Raffauf's personal signature.
Euromotorsport and the Ferrari were being cut down in the political crossfire between two rival sanctioning bodies that had publicly agreed to work together but now obviously would not.
Then it was discovered that the bellcranks on the Ferrari's pushrod suspension carried an additional link connected to some sort of electronic device - perhaps an illegal active suspension, thought the French. In fact, these sophisticated electromechanical links were merely potentiometers used in practice to gather data on the track surface, but an increasingly paranoid Antonio Ferrari refused to remove
the front bodywork so the inspectors could get a closer look. He claimed he was shielding a costly and unique front-suspension system from competitors roaming the technical area, but to the scrutineers, Ferrari's refusal seemed to indicate a high-tech cheater at work.
A cultural impasse, French versus Italian, had been reached. The French wanted to know all about the suspension devices, while the Italian - not sure where this sensitive information might go - would only point out that the components could not be an active suspension because there was no power going in to drive them.
Antonio Ferrari, keenly aware that extralegal tricks have always been a part of racing, feared that one of the ACO officials might pass the team's technological secrets on to their French competitors. He also felt he was being purposely delayed so that his 333SP would not have enough practice time to make a viable bid for the pole. That the obdurate French "were not intelligent enough to understand" the
Ferrari's suspension was not his concern: "I do not have time to re-educate the cretinous scrutineers for the benefit of others!" he said.
The yellow car was consequently mired in the tech line for more than three hours, enveloped in a blue haze of shouted Italian curses and bitter French invective, and by the end of the day it still had not earned the required sticker of approval. Meanwhile, the entries stuck in line behind the 333SP fumed as wellAntonio Ferrari was not endearing himself to anyone.
The scrutineers, of course, saw it from a different perspective - a French perspective. Exactly because trickery is such a common event in motorsports, they felt an extra-keen responsibility to ensure a fair race - meaning everyone had to follow the same carefully structured rules. Any team which appeared uncooperative was suspect, and would be subjected to an even more complete and thorough inspection than its fellows. This, the governing officials believed, was the only way to guarantee equality and fairness.
Of course, what went largely unsaid was that when it came to Ferrari,
the ACO's fears had sound historical precedent. Works Ferraris in previous
years had often tried to circumvent the rules, frequently with success. When this
trickery was later discovered (and truculently leaked to the press), the French
officials had been made to feel foolish and embittered. No, there would be none
of that nonsense again this year! Nor did it matter that the yellow 333SP was
supposedly not a works entry; the French thought it could have been a technical
red-herring sent by Maranello to test the scrutineers' technical expertise. If the car was found to be a cheater, it could always be disavowed by the factory, which would have learned exactly how far they could push the rules the following year without risking their own reputation.
After hours of discussion the next day, the ACO finally agreed to allow
the 333SP through tech if a rev limiter of their choice would be fit at
Euromotorsport's expense. But by now Antonio Ferrari was beyond patience; he explained again to
the officials, the press and anyone else who would listen the facts as he saw them:
His team had no control over the engines, which were factory-supplied components
his contract forbid him from touching. The existing IMSA rev limiter and recorder were operable and
legal under the agreement he had made in Paris with Bertaut. And not only would attaching a new rev
limiter require him to breach his contract with the Ferrari factory and lose valuable time and effort, it might
even damage the engine's delicate electronics by creating additional signal noise.
Daniel Perdrix countered by producing an English-made Stacks rev counter he said could be "easily attached" to the flywheel. And, if Ferrari did
not comply, he added, the car would not run - period.
Suspicion simply ruled the day. Stacks' technical representative to the ACO, Lawrence Wilkensen, stated - on notice to the assembled French journalists that he could not be quoted by name - that "Stacks is capable of building a `black box' that will filter the engine's...rpm to read the legal 10,500 while it actually runs at 13,000-plus. And if we are capable of such trickery, so are the Italians." Antonio
Ferrari's inability to produce specs or dyno sheets for Perdrix also strained the Frenchman's patience to the breaking point.
Finally - inevitably - this entire imbroglio came back to the ACO's fax to Gagniault, the one Ferrari says he never received. Perdrix pointed out that Ferrari's own entry specifically named Gagniault as his designated technical representative in France, but by now Gagniault had conveniently disappeared: impasse.
So Ferrari decided on a new tack. He cornered Perdrix and pointed out that the
Magnetti-Marelli rev-counter had been specially developed for the 12-cylinder Ferrari, and that its sampling circuitry was far more sophisticated than the ACO's officially recognized Stacks. "In fact," said Ferrari, the Stacks was "too primitive" to work on the Ferrari at all, and if mounted on the engine would deliver inaccurate data above 3000 rpm. The argument went on for a full day after tech, until finally a compromise seemed possible. Ferrari would allow the Stacks counter to be installed, "but," he added, because of his contract with the factory, "the ACO and (Stacks) would have to (do) the installation."
"No deal," Perdrix countered. "We can't be responsible if there's an engine failure and we're blamed." After several more hours of this, both parties decided that a mutually agreeable third party would install the parts under the direct supervision of the ACO and Stacks' representatives. This required that the completely race-ready 333SP be disassembled so a new triggering mechanism could be
attached inside the Ferrari's bellhousing.
The young American mechanics had already been working seven days a week, 12 hours a day for a month and a half, and they were haggard, jet-lagged and frustrated. Still, with a chance to finally get their car on the grid, they eagerly dove into the project - they had come to France to win, and their attitude was still positive.
By Thursday evening the Stacks counter was installed, and the next morning both sides' computer experts attached their laptops to the Ferrari's engine for a rev check. Side by side they studied the rev figures as the engine wound higher. Through 1000, 2000, 3000 rpm, both signals ran exactly parallel, but then, at 3500, the Stacks unit suddenly blacked out - exactly as predicted by Antonio Ferrari! No amount of finagling by the English technicians could make it read higher. Suddenly the once-stoic French
officials looked seriously distressed.
As intellectually honest as they were technically unbending, the ACO's scrutineers knew the moral rope they'd tied around Ferrari had just snared them as well. The failure of the Stacks rev-counter meant the ACO couldn't independently verify the 333SP's rpm reading, but Euromotorsport had at last fully complied with all their official directives. Morally, the team was now entitled to practice and qualify.
A deeply concerned Perdrix came again to the Ferrari pit and was assured by the Italian team manager that IMSA's rev limiter was operative, legal and accurate. Thus an ACO seal was reluctantly attached to the car's data acquisition system; the Ferrari would be cleared for practice after one more signature from the team manager agreeing that his car's computer could be monitored at any time during practice or after the race. Ferrari readily agreed, and told his drivers and mechanics to get ready.
Nighttime. American Jay Cochran sits suited up for practice; the ACO's scoring transponder is mounted in the chassis. The engine has already been warmed for the assault. Every-one waits. And waits. The ACO expects Ferrari to come to the tower to sign the affidavit, but Ferrari thinks the ACO will come to him. When it becomes apparent that another hitch has developed, at first Ferrari uses the time (and 10-deep media) to voice his feelings of vindication. After 45 minutes of waiting, however, he capitulates
and takes the elevator to the directors' floor of the tower and signs the paper. This last formality over, the ACO's representatives descend and attach the final sticker. French decorum has been maintained. In the end, two entire days have evaporated.
By now the first evening practice is almost over, so there's no way to perform any serious testing. Cochran makes a few warmup laps before re-entering the pit lane and disgustedly informing his crew that the engine is "lazy."
A disgusted Massimo Sigala fleshes out the analysis: The engine is "either lame, damaged, or the Ferrari factory has betrayed us." With the political infighting over at last, it finally sinks in that Euromotorsport still has to deal with the myriad problems of actually going racing. It's by now far too
late to test Ferrari's special aero package, as just getting the regular powertrain and bodywork up to speed before qualifying ends will be a major challenge. Even with the sick engine and stock body, however, drivers Sigala, Cochran and René Arnoux get the car onto the grid by the last session Thursday night. That leaves all day Friday to change the engine and make final preparations for the Saturday-afternoon start. Not only must the engine be swapped before then, all the highly stressed components are scheduled
for replacement: brakes, axles, hubs, uprights - everything.
Around midnight Friday, another problem is discovered with the new engine just before it's installed. The head of a small hex-screw holding a throttle butterfly in place has sheared off, and the tiny piece of broken steel is lying mysteriously on the throttle plate. If anyone had opened the throttle, the shrapnel would have fallen right into the combustion chamber and quickly destroyed the cylinder.
Pure paranoia takes hold: Could the factory have done this intentionally? And if so, what else could be wrong? A very careful survey follows, turning up a loose water-pump stud but nothing more. Then the even bigger question: How to mend the damaged part? If the butterfly came loose at speed it could jam the throttle wide open, or the remaining threaded shaft might unscrew itself and fall into the engine. But even if time would allow it, the process of removing the tiny screw body might cause more harm than good. Finally, crew chief Coggin uses some high-temp Locktite to fix the part in place
and says, "That's it - run it." Not all of his mechanics agree this is safe.
Antonio Ferrari is denounced as "uncooperative" by Alain Bertaut at the ACO's press conference the morning of the race, and stung by this remark, the Italian team manager calls his own conference two hours later. The inside buzz is that after days of trying to comply with the ACO's directives, this latest insult is simply too much: Ferrari will withdraw his car in protest. But no - Antonio Ferrari announces that he, his team, his sponsors and his factory have worked too hard to turn back now. And, after
citing again his grievances against the ACO's officials - that they are incompetent, arbitrary, et al - he says that if the Ferrari didn't run as planned, the fans would riot and civil mayhem would ensue. This statement causes quite a stir, because up to that point neither the press, the organizers or the police are aware of any such danger.
In the final Saturday-morning warmup something in the Ferrari's transmission fails, so in the end the Euromotorsport crew has to work down to the last possible second to get their car on the grid. When the entrants are finally started for the warmup lap, the Ferrari is still in the pits with Massimo Sigala suited up while the crew makes final checks. He climbs in as the field disappears up the main straight. Ready or not, the car has to complete the warmup lap or be disqualified. Euromotorsport's long, costly and highly painful week comes a mere few seconds from being all for naught.
After the tricolore falls at 4:00 p.m., Sigala, in the 10th row, has to test the car before he can trust it. Within a lap he's determined that everything seems reliable. The transmission feels operable and the backup engine is running strong - not perfect, but much better than the first one. When he is finally certain it will hold together, Sigala starts eating through the field. By the fourth lap he's down to 1:46 -
the originally predicted time and one that would have put them on the pole - and moving up for fifth place. In another lap he reaches fourth, then third overall. Whatever else happens, Euromotorsport has proven one thing: The 333SP Ferrari is fast!
The glorious sound of the V12 quits on the seventh lap, when something comes loose in the bellhousing and collects the ignition trigger. The engine goes off song for a moment and then dies entirely.
Massimo Sigala is filled with doubt as he dejectedly trudges back to the pits, keenly aware of the utter disappointment this trip has been for the team. There is no bright spot to it; no feeling of camaraderie or moral justification. There has been no pleasure in any of it, just weeks and weeks of hard work, sleepless nights, huge expenditures and bitter acrimony. All for seven miserable laps. Who was to
blame? Was it even worth blaming anyone?
Who even cared?
Racing is a cruel sport. And perhaps, as my waiter friend said in his philosophical comment, it's not the same anymore. Then again, maybe it's not so different today as we think.
