Lamborghini 350 GTV Prototype

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Lamborghini 350 GTV Prototype

The No. 1 in Ferruccio Lamborghini's garage didn`t even win the wooden spoon. The design, which is greatly revered by today's connoisseurs, got the thumbs down from the expert audience at the Turin Auto Salon in 1963.

There are plenty of reasons to assume that Ferruccio Lamborghini (1916-1977) must have been a very happy man: 1. In his lifetime he was one of Europe's most successful and important engineers.

2. He built the hottest sports cars and got to spend hours in them racing around country roads in northern Italy.

3. He showed his arch-rival, Enzo, that the sports cars built in S. Agata Bolognese had what it takes under their bonnets and were additionally blessed with divine forms.

4. He succeeded in getting out of the high-octane automobile business in time and retired to the tranquillity of his vineyard. Whether he enjoyed the same level of success with his grapes as he did with his cars, we do not know.

Futuristic, unsellable and no serious competition for Ferrari: the press tore Lamborghini's first car to bits. Even after Bertone redesigned the body, a mere 129 customers purchased model 350 GT.

Four overhead camshafts, individual wheel suspension front and rear, and the bullish power of 12 cylinders were to make the Lamborghini 350 GT a successful car which could hold its own against the red racers from Maranello.