2014 Ferrari 458 on 2040-cars

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Heads continue to roll at Scuderia Ferrari

It's a year of restructuring at Ferrari – especially when it comes to the Formula One department. Dissatisfied with the team's performance of late, parent company Fiat fired Ferrari's chairman, replaced its team principal twice and brought in another multiple world champion to replace the one it already had. But that's not the end of it. Under the direction of new chairman Sergio Marchionne and team principal Maurizio Arrivabene, the Maranello-based outfit is undergoing a purge in its ranks. Ferrari has fired its veteran engineering director Pat Fry (pictured above at left), its chief designer Nicolas Tombazis (center) and its tire guru Hirohide Hamashima (whom the team picked up shortly after Bridgestone left the sport, not pictured). In their places, Ferrari has named appropriate replacements, and has shuffled some additional staff around. F1 journalist Alberto Antonini, for example, has taken over the press office from Renato Bisignani who will now run the Scuderia's new commercial department. More vital, however, is James Allison, a longtime F1 engineer who previously worked for Ferrari for five years and returned from Lotus last year to take up position as the team's new technical director – too late to influence last season's chassis but now charged with developing next year's. Whether the radical reshuffling of its staff will be enough to reverse the team's fortunes, nobody can say for certain at this point. But without a single grand prix victory this past season, things can hardly get any worse for what historically has been the most victorious team in all of motorsport. The Scuderia Ferrari has been reorganized Maranello, 16 December – Within a few days from his arrival Maurizio Arrivabene, Managing Director of Ferrari's Gestione Sportiva and Team Principal of Scuderia Ferrari, has restructured his team with a flatter structure and clear assignment of responsibilities. James Allison is the Technical Director with two Italian engineers and home grown Scuderia talent reporting to him: Chief Designer Simone Resta and Power Unit Director Mattia Binotto, the latter will be supported by Chief Designer Power Unit Lorenzo Sassi, among others. Furthermore James Allison will direct track engineering activities ad interim.

Nigel Mansell's Ferrari F40 sells for $870k

If you look at the $1.35 million price tag on the new LaFerrari and wonder how Ferrari can possibly charge that much for a single car, you could look at the prices of its competitors like the McLaren P1 that lists for almost as much at $1.15 million, you could look to the $2.5 million which Ferrari is said to have charged for the exclusive F60 America - or you could look at the prices at which LaFerrari's predecessors are still trading. Take, for example, this Ferrari F40 which, 25 years since it was built, just sold for nearly $870,000 at auction.
The F40 in question, a 1989 model, may be just one of 1,315 examples made, but it has a rather noteworthy provenance: the car once belonged to Nigel Mansell, the only driver ever to hold both the Formula One and Indy titles at the same time. That Mansell - a man who had access to some of the fastest and most capable racing cars ever made - selected the F40 as his personal ride of choice speaks volumes about the car's abilities and appeal. But then he did, after all, drive for the Scuderia that season, winning the Brazilian and Hungarian grands prix.
The celebrity provenance, however, may not have actually jacked the price up at all. While it may rank towards the top of the list, this was hardly the highest price paid for an F40 at auction. According to Sports Car Market, which tracks such sales, the record currently belongs to a 1993 Ferrari F40 LM that Bonhams also sold for $2.2 million at Monterey. The highest price for a standard, non-LM model was recorded at the same event at $1.43 million.

Former Top Gear crew starts filming for Amazon show

We might have only a hint at the name and no exact date for a premiere, but fans can celebrate that Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May are filming once again. Plus, it looks like every cent of Amazon's reportedly lavish budget is being put on the screen. A photo tweeted by Clarkson shows the three hosts standing proudly in front of a Porsche 918 Spyder, Ferrari LaFerrari, and McLaren P1 at a racetrack. Clarkson jokes that the show has just a "skeleton crew" but behind him stand several dozen people, a sophisticated-looking camera rig, and two big trucks. This definitely looks worth the anticipation of the premiere on Amazon Prime next fall. Hammond tweeted the same picture and wrote: "The band is back together and it feels brilliant." This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Intriguingly, it appears that fellow British auto journalist Chris Harris is currently filming at the same track. He tweeted a photo to Clarkson of the McLaren doing a very smoky slide, while being followed by the other two hypercars. The Porsches in both photos wear the same red-and-white number 3 livery and have the same license plate number. In a later message, Harris was also clear that he wasn't filming there in connection with the trio's Amazon show. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.