Breadvan - A Ferrari to beat the GTO

Built as a Ferrari 250 GT Short Wheelbase Competizione, chassis number 2819 GT has become famous as the instantly recognisable ‘Breadvan’ – a fan favourite around the world. This latest book from Porter Press tells its full story, from being delivered new to sports car ace Olivier Gendebien and its 1962 conversion into the Breadvan by Count Giovanni Volpi di Misurata, to its recent appearances at Goodwood and Le Mans. 

Written by renowned author Richard Heseltine, with contributions from Nicola von Dönhoff and leading Ferrari historian Keith Bluemel, it documents the development of the 250 GT Berlinettas, the ‘Palace Coup’ at Maranello that led to the birth of the Breadvan, and the car’s racing career in the hands of aces such as Ludovico Scarfiotti and Carlo Maria Abate.

Breadvan – A Ferrari To Beat The GTO is packed with new research, such as confirmation of 2819 GT’s appearances at Daytona and Sebring in 1962, as well as profiles of all the main players in the story and hundreds of archive photographs. Heseltine also documents Serenissima’s life after the Breadvan, and brings the car’s story up to date with its successful ‘second life’ in historic motor racing.

• History of the Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta, plus the racing life of 2819 GT before it was converted into the Breadvan.
• Profiles of all the key players in the car’s period competition career, including Giotto Bizzarrini, Olivier Gendebien, Carlo Maria Abate and Ludovico Scarfiotti.
• Detailed reports of each of 2819 GT’s race appearances at events such as the Le Mans 24 Hours, Tour de France and Paris 1,000Km.
• Why Gianni Agnelli painted the Breadvan black – and Gunter Sachs got arrested in it.
• Full story of the car’s later life, from its adventures in the US to its return to racing in the UK during the 1970s.
• Details of the Breadvan’s recent success in historic motor sport, from its return to Le Mans to victory at Goodwood. 

Specification

ISBN: 978-1-907085-36-9

Author: Richard Heseltine

285 x 235mm, 224 pages

Jacketed Hardback

Over 220 images

The author – Richard Heseltine

Journalist and author specialising in classic and contemporary performance cars. A former staff member of Classic & Sports Car and Motor Sport, for whom he remains a regular contributor, he has also written extensively for Octane, Classic Cars and Auto Italia in addition to newspapers such as The Guardian. He has written several books on subjects as diverse as the British specialist sports car industry and coachbuilt Ferraris. He has also owned, driven and pushed countless Italian classic cars over the past 25 years.

The author – Keith Bluemel

Keith Bluemel started writing about Ferrari in 1980, initially as a contributor to the Ferrari Owners’ Club magazine Ferrari, for which he still writes regularly. He then broadened out to work for many Ferrari-specific magazines around the world.

He is a long-time contributing editor to the respected American Ferrari magazine Cavallino and has been its competition editor since 2004. He also contributes to Ferrari Magazine (the official magazine produced for the factory by Condé Nast), Prancing Horse (the official magazine of the Ferrari Club of America) and Ferrari Club (the official magazine of Club Ferrari France). He is also a regular contributing editor/photographer to two Ferrari-themed websites: www.barchetta.cc and www.anamera.com.

Prior to his ‘Great Cars’ GTO book for Porter Press, Keith co-authored (with Jess G. Pourret) Ferrari 250 GTO (Bay View, 1998) and was a contributing editor to GTO Book (Fink Presse France, 2009). He has also written four titles about other models of Ferrari: Original Ferrari V8 (Bay View), Ferrari: The Road Cars (Sutton), Original Ferrari V12, 1965–73 (Bay View) and Ferrari: The Racing Cars (Sutton). He was the technical editor for Jeremy Clarkson on Ferrari (Lancaster Publishing, 2000) and co-author of a book on the Ferrari 250 GT ‘Breadvan’ (Parker House Publishing, 2010).

Keith is a life member of the Ferrari Owners’ Club and a Ferrari Club of America concours judge. He has been a Ferrari class judge at Concorso Italiano, the Winter Park Concours, Concours on the Avenue (Carmel), Pebble Beach, Salon Privé and the Ferrari factory’s 60th Anniversary Concorso d’Eleganza in 2007.