Intermediate
It has to be written now: Somehow we don’t believe this story. Sure, it’s true, it’s proven, on 1 June 1985 the Ferrari 288 GTO was officially homologated for Group B by the FIA. And that’s why 20 Evo models were allowed to be built each year. All good, but: What did Ferrari want in Group B? Drive rallies? Against Audi, Peugeot and group sister Lancia? Either Ferrari was massively on the wrong track in the mid-80s (which happened quite often, currently: Formula 1. Or Purosangue) – or maybe the story is different. And other considerations led to the Ferrari 288 GTO Evoluzione. Only: we don’t know. But rally victories were certainly not what Maranello was planning with the further development of the 288 GTO.
However: Probably five Ferrari 288 GTO Evoluzione were built. And they were quite something: Compared to the 288 GTO, which was already not weak, the power increased by 60 percent to 650 hp, mainly due to larger turbos. Pininfarina worked on the weight, carbon was still a hot thing at the time, but in Turin the weight was brought down to 940 kilos – a power-to-weight ratio of 1.61 kg/hp. The Ferrari 288 GTO Evoluzione is certainly not a design icon, but its peculiar shape was at least very aerodynamic – a top speed of 369.9 km/h was achieved during test drives.
There are now even more questions. This car here, chassis number ZFFPX16X0J0079888, was completed with the help of Michelotto in 1988. By then Group B had been: dead (literally) for more than a year. And the F40 had also been in production for a year. So it was actually completely pointless to still build this car – and then to buy it, as the Belgian Gentelman driver Jean Blaton did via Jacques Swaters’ legendary Garage Francorchamps. Blaton, blessed with wealth and also plenty of driving talent, raced successfully from the 1950s to the 1970s, often under the pseudonym “Beurlys” – and stood on the podium several times at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Oh yes, he was also an excellent jazz musician.
Anyway, by 1992 “Beurlys” had had enough of this actually unnecessary intermediate stage between the 288 GTO and the F40, the car went back to Swaters, who kept it until 2006. Then Lawrence Stroll probably wrote out a very big check, he was building up a fine Ferrari collection at the time (see also: Ferrari 250 GTO #3451GT). In 2013, he gave up the venture, the Evo subsequently passed through several hands, was made roadworthy, recently refurbished at Michelotto for a lot of money – and is coming up for sale at a “sealed auction” by RM Sotheby’s from 19 to 21 October. Rare it is, this Ferrari 288 GTO Evoluzione, but certainly not rarely beautiful. And yes, there are still those question marks around its very basic existence.
We recently wrote something about the Ferrari prototypes.
But we also have very beautiful classic Ferraris in our archives.
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