Stupid Question

Was watching the American Le mans series racing today seeing the Saleen's, viper's, corvette's, Maser's etc... and it dawned on me. Where are the Ferrari's? Nothing in the P1 or P2 classes either. Is it we just have nothing to compete in those type of series? Or what? I suppose I should know this but for some reason I'm drawing a blank. Can any of you more knowledgeable folks shed some light on this for me. I apologise in advance for probably asking such a stupid question but it just bug's me not knowing why. I'd just love to see an F-car out there whooping up on them.

Thanks

Kurt
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There is nothing like a Ferrari, there never has been and never will be!

 

Maybe they can't afford the maintenance!
I'd put one of those smilly icons, but don't know how to do it yet.

 

The Ferrari 550s are running in the similar European series; the LMES. They qualified 1 and 2 for the race at the Nurburgring today, but the Aston Martin won the class. NONE of the cars in GT1 are true factory efforts. Ferrari simply can't afford to run a factory effort in GT1 and in F1. The last prototype Ferrari was the 333SP, and the F50 LeMans effort never got beyond 3 prototypes being built; none of which ever ran in a championship series race, but one of which is occassionally seen in "vintage" racing. Symbolic Motors had one of the F50 race cars in their showroom for quite some time...

 

So basically it comes down to the allmighty $$$. And If they were going to do anything like that it would be in the European venue and not here in the US.
Fair enough. Guess I'll have to check out the LMES series. Hope it comes on speed channel.

Kurt
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There is nothing like a Ferrari, there never has been and never will be!

 

http://www.lmes.net is the web site, and you can click on the English flag way in the upper right. Speed TV has shown shortened versions of rounds of the LMES in the past, but usually 6 months after the fact.

 

I don't buy that for a second. I bleed Rossa Scuderia but I'm also a skeptic when it comes to Ferrari's "limited funds."

I do believe that they fear not being able to field dominant factory efforts in both F1 and GT1. And since they don't think they will win in GT1, they don't compete.

 

I don't think Ferrari really makes all that much money, relative to many other car companies. 5000 cars a year at an average of $200,000 is only 1 billion. What does it cost to make the cars, distribute them, advertise them, etc?

The F1 team alone costs almost 350 million a year, and even with a lot of that being piad by sponsors, compared to other car companies, financially, Ferrari is just a drop in the bucket.

Now compare that to Toyota, who makes a LOT more money than Ferrari....and they dropped out of sports car racing to enter F1.

The costs of racing are VERY high, and investors want to make money..

 

Doc, we'll never know the real answer, so most of this discussion is academic, but I just want to point that selling cars and selling advertising on F1 cars is not Ferrari's only source of income.

-Don't the dealers pay Ferrari for the privlege of being dealers?

-Doesn't Ferrari make a killing on selling spare parts through their dealer network?

-Doesn't Ferrari make money on the Corsa Clienti program (surely they don't do it entirely for the fun of it?)

-Doesn't Ferrari make untold millions on licensing their trademarks for knick-knacks, T Shirts, Hats, Jackets, etc?

-Doesn't Formula 1 pay a ton of money to the teams just to show up, in addition to the sponsorship monies each team recieves?

-How about the engines that the F1 program lease to Sauber (and next year they will lease engines to Red Bull as well)... That's another revenue stream in the multi-millions.

The above are guesses... If anyone knows for sure whether I am right or wrong, please share.

In summary, you will never convince me that Ferrari doesn't make a handsome profit. I guess the issue we're discussing is whether or not they would continue to make a handsome profit if they went sports car racing. I contend that they would.
[end thread hijack]

 

We were advised on several occasions when visiting the factory that Ferrari chooses to put their efforts into F1.

There's a Ferrari running in the GT class in the Rolex series but the 360 is just not competitive against the Porsches. That car is currently 5th of 7 in standings.

The ALMS race yesterday was a good one - a couple more laps and I think the Saleen would have taken the Corvettes. That is one beautiful car. Petite Le Mans will be very good with the Astons and new Porsche running the last two ALMS races.

Carol