F40 ex-Mansell + F50 #001 public viewing in Miami tomorrow

Does the Mansell car still have those awful leather seats he had fitted? from memory he flipped it very quickly after delivery for a healthy profit then tried to sue the buyer as they resold it for even more and he wanted a slice of that to!

 

F50 #001 is actually chassis number 103097.
While it does have a tag stating 001/349 it is by no means the first F50 built.
There are (20) twenty F50 chassis numbers earlier (lower) than this one.
103097 was originally owned by Belgian real estate magnate and race driver Jean Blaton.

Marcel Massini

 

Is the one pictured here the ex Blaton car? I dont remember the Blaton car having the US bigger moustaches.

 

The ex-Mansell F40 has the standard red Nomex seats again, the previouis tan leather seats were not fitted by Mansell, but by a subsequent owner.

That's not what happened. In the Autumn of 1989, Mansell contracted to sell the gifted F40 to David McKee for £680,000. At the same time, John Collins of Talacrest offered Mansell £1,000,000 and so the car was sold to Talacrest instead. This began a lengthy legal battle between Mansell and McKee which was resolved with Mansell having to pay McKee the £320,000 difference.

Yes that's the ex-Blaton F50, good spot, at some point it has gained the Tipo USA nose, perhaps he wants a bit more downforce at high speed, most important thing about this F50 IMO is how often it is driven & enjoyed.

 

Call the 680k - 670k difference of 10k attorney's fees!

Meanwhile I'm fairly sure my version is correct and Talacrest got the car direct whereas McKee was simply paid the difference, here below is John Collins on the day he collected the car directly from Nigel Mansell's dealership.

As regards the F50, I think a reinforced Tipo USA nose was applied as part of this car's USA DOT Federalization process which included the side-markers you mention, now deleted.

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he had his own petrol station?

 

FWIW 80022 was originally registered on Italian tourist plates EE 729 AK, and then Mansell got Isle of Man plates MAN 40 N, and Collins had it re-registered on English license plates F 226 YRU.

Marcel Massini

 

He had his own dealership at the time, South coast way from memory, so I guess it came with a petrol station.

I think the car was part of his package when he joined Ferrari from Williams, maybe a Testarossa as well?

I was told an F40 belonging to Mansell had a replacement rear clip fitted at some point, no idea if it was this one though or another at his dealership. I know where that original clip is. It is a very early clip, no numbers at all cast into the aerofoil part.

 

Why not, petrol stations can be very profitable.

Nigel Mansell Sports Cars, he sold it to the Westover Group.

Here's Mansell with the car at an open day at the dealership when he hosted the UK Ferrari Club.

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Another image of Mansell and the F40, I believe from the same day.

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of course, just an odd fact I never knew - here in the UK it is rare to have independently owned petrol stations

 

It was a Mobil station, perhaps that means something.

 

1989 was a roller coaster year…Ferraris were selling for absolutely stupid prices. The speculation led to all sorts of shenanigans and people/speculators losing large baskets full of hard cash when the economy burst a year or so later. It took decades in some cases for the rebound.