Tag Archives: Frevel

Raced, Stolen & Broken Up – Ferrari 166MM Vignale Spyder S2 #0314M

With the first of 8 victories in the last 11 Mille Miglia races run in 1948 Ferrari built a huge following for his sports cars and the following year returned and won with the 166MM model of which 33 similar chassis were built and clothed with bodies from Touring, Vignale, and Zagato.

Ferrari 166MM Vignale Spyder S2, William Boddy Tribute, Brooklands

Commencing in 1952 a second series of 13 166MM chassis was built, seven of which originally had Vignale bodies like the one on #0314M which was sold to Edoardo Lualdi-Gabardi who drove #0314M in hillclimb and race events through the second half of 1953.

Edoardo’s best results were two thirds one at the Circuito di Senigallia and the other in the 12 hour race at Pescara where he shared the driving with a driver called Pinzero. At the end of the 1953 season the motor was upgraded to a 3 litre / 183 cui spec and the car was sold to Primo Pezzoli competed with the car and like it’s previous owner scored a season best 3rd on the Trieste-Opicina hillclimb.

The known competition history of #0314 resumed in 1959 when Arrigo Cantelli is thought to have used it for hillclimbing. In 1961 #0314M was acquired by German treasure hunter Helmut Frevel and the following year it scored a 2nd in the 7th Tuerckheim-Les Trois Epis hillclimb and 3rd in the 4th Macon-Solutre hillclimb though on neither occasion is Frevel thought to have been at the wheel.

Frevel’s work took him to South Africa in 1963 and he took #0314M with him until 1967. In 1993 owner Peter Glaesel had the car restored by DK Engineering in Watford. In 1998 Walter Fink acquired #0314M and it appeared in the 1999 and 2000 retro Mille Miglia events. The day after the latter the car was stolen and was not heard of again until 2008 when it was found striped of everything including the motor and gearbox in an Italian scap yard.

New owner Phillip Hylander sent the car back to DK Engineering to be restored to it’s present condition in 2009 and #0314M is seen in today’s photograph at the William Boddy Tribute at Brooklands several years ago.

Thanks for joining me on this “Raced, Stolen & Broken Up” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at a Nova. Don’t forget to come back now !

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