# Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa
Source: https://fullysorted.com/research/models/ferrari/250-testa-rossa
Publisher: Fully Sorted (fullysorted.com), collector car research
Last updated: 2026-09-21

## Key facts
- Make: Ferrari
- Model: 250 Testa Rossa
- Factory code: Tipo 525 chassis, Tipo 128 engine
- Years: 1957 to 1961
- Body styles: 2-seat open sports-racing spider, Scaglietti pontoon-fender body (customer cars, 1957-1958), 2-seat open sports-racing spider, enveloping body (works cars, 1958-1961; Fantuzzi bodies on the later works cars)
- Engines: 2,953 cc Tipo 128 Colombo 60-degree V12, single overhead camshaft per bank, 73 x 58.8 mm, six Weber 38 DCN two-barrel carburetors, 300 hp at 7,000 rpm (Gooding and Company lists 300 hp at 7,200 rpm for the prototype)
- Production notes: No production figure for the 250 Testa Rossa is agreed on by the sources fetched for this page, and the disagreements are about scope rather than counting. Sports Car Market, in its profile of chassis 0714 TR, states that 34 250 Testa Rossas were built including prototypes and the 330 TRI/LM, and its profile of 0666 TR repeats 34 cars built from 1957 until 1962; the supercars.net guide also says 34 units of the 250 TR and its variants. Wikipedia and classic.com both put the figure at 33 of all types between 1957 and 1962, with 19 customer cars sold to independent teams, and autoevolution also says 33. The difference is most likely whether the 1962 330 TRI/LM, a four-liter car on a Testa Rossa chassis, is counted, but no source consulted here says so explicitly, so productionTotal is left null. The pontoon-fender count is a second, separate disagreement: Sports Car Market says 0714 TR is one of only 21 cars with pontoon fenders, while Autoblog and conceptcarz, both reporting the 2024 RM Sotheby's sealed sale of 0738 TR, say the design is present in only 19 cars, which matches the 19 customer cars in Wikipedia and classic.com. Whether the two prototypes and the early works cars are included is the likely explanation; again, not stated by any source. What is not in dispute is the shape of the run: two 1957 prototypes, a batch of customer cars built through 1958 for privateers, and a small number of works cars each year through 1961 that were rebodied, rebuilt and renumbered as the factory saw fit, which is exactly why a single clean number does not exist. Sports Car Market lists the original price as approximately $12,000; that figure appears in two Sports Car Market profiles and nowhere else in this research, so it is a single-publisher figure.

## Summary
The Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa was built because the FIA capped sports-racing engines at three liters for 1958, and Ferrari answered with a 2,953 cc Colombo V12 wearing six Weber carburetors and red-painted cam covers, the source of the name. The customer cars, bodied by Scaglietti with cutaway pontoon fenders to cool their drum brakes, went to privateers through 1958, while the works cars gained disc brakes and a five-speed for 1959 and independent rear suspension for 1961. The results were Le Mans wins in 1958, 1960 and 1961, Sebring wins in 1958, 1959 and 1961, and three world championships. In the United States, Luigi Chinetti took delivery of the prototype 0666 TR at Le Mans in June 1958, and the cars raced at Sebring, Nassau and SCCA events into the mid-1960s. The sources fetched for this page disagree on production, 33 cars against 34 and 19 pontoon-fender cars against 21, so no single total is stated here. As of September 2026 the public reference points are 0666 TR at $16,390,000 including premium at Gooding in August 2011 and 0738 TR, estimated at up to $38 million in a February 2024 sealed sale and recorded as not sold.

## Specifications
- body: Scaglietti pontoon-fender aluminum spider on the customer cars; Fantuzzi enveloping bodies on later works cars
- power: 300 hp at 7,000 rpm (Wikipedia, autoevolution, Classic Insurance); Gooding and Company lists 300 hp at 7,200 rpm for chassis 0666 TR
- width: 60.0 in (1,523 mm) per supercars.net
- brakes: Drum brakes on all four wheels on 1957 and 1958 cars; Dunlop disc brakes on the works cars from the 1959 season
- engine: 2,953 cc Tipo 128 Colombo V12, single overhead camshaft per bank, 73 x 58.8 mm bore and stroke, red-painted cam covers
- layout: Front-engine, rear-wheel drive, two-seat open sports-racing car
- length: 155.9 in (3,959 mm) per supercars.net
- torque: Not published by any source fetched for this page
- weight: 1,764 lb (800 kg) dry, as quoted by Wikipedia, supercars.net and Classic Insurance; no source gives a measured curb weight
- chassis: Tipo 525 tubular steel frame; 92.5 in (2,350 mm) wheelbase
- top_speed: 167 mph per Classic Insurance, a single-source figure
- carburetors: Six Weber 38 DCN two-barrel carburetors, up from the three on a 250 GT engine
- acceleration: No 0-60 mph figure is published by any source fetched for this page
- transmission: Four-speed manual on customer cars; five-speed manual introduced on the works cars for 1959
- price_when_new: Approximately $12,000 per Sports Car Market, a single-publisher figure
- suspension_works: De Dion rear axle with transverse leaf spring on the prototype 0666 TR; independent rear suspension standard on the 1961 works cars
- suspension_customer: Unequal-length A-arms and coil springs in front, live rear axle on the customer cars

## Notable variants
- 250 TR prototypes, 0666 TR and 0704 TR (1957): 0666 TR is the first Testa Rossa built, on the Tipo 525 chassis with a de Dion rear axle and right-hand drive. Sold to Luigi Chinetti in June 1958 and raced in the US through an SCCA event at Santa Barbara in May 1964. Its $16,390,000 result at Gooding's Pebble Beach sale in August 2011 was the world auction record at the time.
- 250 TR customer car, Scaglietti pontoon-fender body (1957-1958): The car most people picture: cutaway front fenders to cool the drum brakes, live rear axle, four-speed gearbox, 300 hp. Nineteen customer cars per Wikipedia and classic.com. This is the version Chinetti sold to American privateers who raced them at Sebring, Nassau and SCCA nationals.
- 250 TR58 works car: The 1958 factory cars that won Sebring, Le Mans and the World Sports Car Championship. Some carried pontoon bodies, some enveloping bodies; still on drum brakes in 1958, which is why Ferrari lost ground to Aston Martin on braking in 1959.
- 250 TR59 and TR59/60 works cars: Dunlop disc brakes and a five-speed gearbox arrived for 1959, with Fantuzzi bodies. The TR59/60 cars won Le Mans in 1960. Works cars were rebuilt from season to season, so chassis identity on these needs a factory-level paper trail.
- 250 TR61 works car: Independent rear suspension became standard and the engine was lowered on dry-sump lubrication. Le Mans and Sebring winners in 1961, the last year of the 250 TR before the four-liter 330 TRI/LM.
- 0738 TR, the 2024 sealed-auction car: A pontoon-fender customer car with nearly 20 period races and four overall wins, Ferrari Classiche Red Book certified with matching engine and gearbox. RM Sotheby's ran it as a sealed-bid sale in February 2024 with an estimate up to $38 million; classic.com records the result as not sold.

## History

### Why the car exists

After a string of major accidents the FIA announced a three-liter displacement limit for the 1958 sports-car season, and Ferrari, whose fastest sports cars were well over that, needed a new car in a hurry. Sports Car Digest's account has Ferrari looking at Aston Martin's DBR1 as the template and setting out to build a three-liter sports car with a reliable, production-based engine, light aerodynamic bodywork and forgiving handling. The engine was the point: rather than a new racing unit, Ferrari took the 2,953 cc Colombo V12 that already powered the 250 GT, fitted six two-barrel Weber 38 DCN carburetors where the road car had three, and painted the cam covers red. The Tipo 128 engine made 300 hp at 7,000 rpm, and the red heads gave the car its name.

### The prototypes and the pontoon body

The first car, 0666 TR, was assembled in 1957 on the Tipo 525 chassis with a de Dion rear axle, transverse leaf spring, A-arms and coil springs in front and right-hand drive, and its first engine was a hotter 250 GT unit before the definitive Tipo 128 LM went in. It debuted at the Nurburgring 1000 Km, finishing tenth. The customer car that followed was simpler: live rear axle, four-speed gearbox and drum brakes on all four corners. Sergio Scaglietti's answer to keeping those drums cool was the pontoon-fender body, with the front fenders cut away behind the wheels so air could pass over the brakes and out through the gap ahead of the doors. Scaglietti considered it his finest work for Ferrari. The Simeone Foundation's 0710 TR shows the detail on the metal: angled cooling fins on the drums and a detachable nosepiece.

### 1958: the year it won everything

The 250 TR opened 1958 with a one-two at Sebring, then won Le Mans with Phil Hill and Olivier Gendebien, and took four of the six championship races to give Ferrari the World Sports Car Championship. The works cars ran with both pontoon and enveloping bodies that year, still on drum brakes. That was the weakness. Aston Martin's disc-braked DBR1 beat Ferrari to the championship in 1959, and Ferrari finally fitted Dunlop discs to all its Scuderia cars for the 1959 season, along with a five-speed gearbox and new Fantuzzi bodywork on what became the TR59. The 1960 cars won Le Mans again, and the 1961 TR61, with independent rear suspension now standard and the engine lowered on dry-sump lubrication, won both Sebring and Le Mans and the championship. Simeone's tally is 22 Testa Rossas entered in 19 international championship races between 1958 and 1961, winning ten.

### The American cars

The US story runs through Luigi Chinetti. In June 1958 Chinetti bought the prototype 0666 TR and took delivery at Le Mans, and the car went on to race Sebring, the Nurburgring and Le Mans again in NART livery before a string of SCCA regional wins in California between 1960 and 1962; its last known race was an SCCA event at Santa Barbara in May 1964. Chassis 0724 TR was repaired at the factory after Le Mans and shipped to Chinetti in New York, then raced in the US by several owners until 1961, when its engine and gearbox were separated from the chassis; a Texas owner later fitted a Corvette V8 and an American rear axle and raced it on and off from 1962 to 1984. 0710 TR ran Nassau in early 1958, sat third at Sebring until the pinion failed in the eleventh hour, then had a long West Coast career with John von Neumann and Richie Ginther. 0714 TR went first to Venezuela, then through American privateers Alan Connell, Charlie Hayes, Carl Haas and Wayne Burnett, who raced it in nine events in 1961 and 1962.

### What the numbers will and will not support

Because the works cars were rebuilt and rebodied between seasons and the customer cars were often re-engined once obsolete, the production count depends on what you count. Sports Car Market and supercars.net say 34 including the prototypes and the 330 TRI/LM; Wikipedia, classic.com and autoevolution say 33, with 19 customer cars. The pontoon-fender count is 21 in Sports Car Market and 19 in the 2024 auction reporting. None of the sources reconciles these, and this page does not either. Original price is a single-publisher figure: Sports Car Market lists approximately $12,000, and no other source fetched here quotes a number.

## What to look for

On a 250 Testa Rossa the paperwork is the car. The works cars were rebuilt, rebodied and sometimes renumbered between seasons, and the customer cars were commonly re-engined once they stopped being competitive, so a chassis, an engine and a body that have been together since 1958 is the exception and the sources say so directly: conceptcarz describes 0738 TR as one of few TRs retaining its matching engine and gearbox, and Sports Car Digest notes that 0666 TR is one of only two factory Classiche-certified TRs in existence. Ferrari Classiche Red Book certification is the current standard of proof, and a car without it needs a chassis-by-chassis history from a marque historian. Paul Russell and Company's frame-up restoration of 0724 TR is a useful model of what a serious restoration uncovers: original paint colors, Le Mans-specific modifications, a rare soft top, door hinge dimples, dissimilar exhaust openings and post-scrutineering changes such as relocated fog lights. Those are the details that separate an original pontoon body from a later re-creation. On the mechanical side, the customer specification is drum brakes, a live rear axle and a four-speed gearbox; a car with Dunlop discs, a five-speed or independent rear suspension is either a works car or has been upgraded, and the difference matters enormously to value. Six Weber 38 DCN carburetors and red cam covers are correct on the Tipo 128 engine. Race history is what these cars trade on, and every one of the well-documented chassis has a period record, from 0666 TR's Le Mans entries and SCCA wins to 0738 TR's four overall victories; a car whose period entries cannot be tied to its chassis number is a car with a question mark. Chinetti delivery, NART livery and a Sebring or Nassau entry are the US provenance markers the market rewards.

## Common problems

The 250 Testa Rossa is a 1950s sports-racing car and its problems are the problems of racing use and sixty-plus years of ownership, not of a production car. The sources fetched for this page document three recurring issues. First, drivetrain separation: 0724 TR had its engine and gearbox separated from the chassis in 1961 and ran for two decades on a Corvette V8 and an American rear axle, and conceptcarz's description of 0738 TR as one of few TRs retaining its matching engine and gearbox tells you how common that was. Reuniting a car with its numbers-matching engine is a matter of luck and money, not mechanics. Second, final-drive and gearbox failures under racing load: 0710 TR's pinion failed in the eleventh hour at Sebring in 1958 while running third, and the four-speed customer gearbox was superseded by a five-speed on the works cars for 1959. Third, brakes: the drum brakes on 1957 and 1958 cars were the car's known weak point against the disc-braked Aston Martin DBR1, which is why the pontoon fenders exist and why Ferrari moved to Dunlop discs in 1959; a drum-braked car driven hard today needs the drums, linings and cooling fins in the condition Scaglietti intended. Bodywork is the fourth area: pontoon bodies were damaged in period, replaced in period and re-created later, and the Paul Russell restoration of 0724 TR shows how much forensic work is needed to establish what is original. The only US cost figures fetched are in Sports Car Market's data block: a tune-up at $2,500 and distributor caps at $450 each, two required, undated.

## Market notes

As of September 2026 classic.com's market page for the 250 Testa Rossa shows no cars for sale and no benchmark figure, which is the normal state of a market where a handful of cars change hands per decade, mostly in private. The public reference points are three. Chassis 0714 TR sold at RM Auctions' Maranello sale on May 17, 2009 for $12,402,500 including buyer's premium, a figure Sports Car Market described as landing in the middle of its own price guide. Chassis 0666 TR, the first Testa Rossa built, sold at Gooding and Company's Pebble Beach sale on August 20, 2011 for $16,390,000 including buyer's premium on a hammer price of $14,900,000, which beat the 0714 TR figure to become the world auction record at the time. Chassis 0738 TR, a pontoon-fender customer car with Ferrari Classiche Red Book certification and its matching engine and gearbox, was offered by RM Sotheby's in a sealed-bid sale that opened in Detroit on February 21, 2024 and closed two days later, with a valuation of $34,000,000 to $38,000,000; classic.com records the lot as not sold. Classic Insurance reports that chassis 0704 TR sold for $39 million in a private transaction, a single-source figure with no date or confirming party, and it is repeated here only as a reported number. Sports Car Market's view in 2011 was that the 250 TR was undervalued next to its closed sister, the 250 GTO, which has since been borne out by GTO results but not tested by a public Testa Rossa sale. No US auction sale of a 250 TR after 2011 could be fetched for this research.

## Value trajectory

The 250 Testa Rossa's public price history is short because so few sell in public. Sports Car Market lists the original price at approximately $12,000, a single-publisher figure. Two decades later the cars were racing club events with Corvette engines. The modern record begins with 0714 TR at $12,402,500 including premium at RM's Maranello sale in May 2009, which Sports Car Market said landed in the middle of its price guide, followed by 0666 TR at $16,390,000 including premium at Gooding's Pebble Beach sale in August 2011, then the world auction record. Sports Car Market wrote at the time that the TR was undervalued against the 250 GTO and that one historian expected the finest examples to reach $25 million. The next public data point did not come until February 2024, when RM Sotheby's offered 0738 TR in a sealed sale with a valuation of $34,000,000 to $38,000,000 and classic.com recorded it as not sold; Classic Insurance separately reports a $39 million private sale of 0704 TR without a date. As of September 2026 classic.com shows no 250 TR for sale and no benchmark, so the honest reading is that the market's asking level has roughly doubled since 2011 while the last confirmed public sale is still the 2011 car.

## Sources

- [1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://www.sportscarmarket.com/profile/1957-ferrari-250-testa-rossa) (Sports Car Market)
- [1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa Prototype](https://www.sportscarmarket.com/profile/1957-ferrari-250-testa-rossa-prototype) (Sports Car Market)
- [Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa - History, Photos, Profile](https://sportscardigest.com/ferrari-250-testa-rossa-car-profile/) (Sports Car Digest)
- [Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa Market](https://www.classic.com/m/ferrari/250/testa-rossa/) (classic.com)
- [1958 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://simeonemuseum.org/collection/1958-ferrari-250-testa-rossa/) (Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum)
- [Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrari_250_Testa_Rossa) (Wikipedia)
- [1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://www.goodingco.com/lot/1957-ferrari-250-testa-rossa) (Gooding and Company)
- [1958 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa last available at RM Sotheby's Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa (Sealed) (2024)](https://www.classic.com/a/rm-sothebys-ferrari-250-testa-rossa-sealed-2024-PWxxmxW/lots/1958-ferrari-250-testa-rossa-nBQEVB4/) (classic.com)
- [Gooding and Company Expects to Break the All-time World Auction Record in Pebble Beach with the Legendary 1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa Prototype](https://www.goodingco.com/press/article/gooding-and-company-expects-to-break-the-all-time-world-auction-record-in/) (Gooding and Company)
- [RM Sotheby's auctioning Scaglietti-bodied 1958 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://www.autoblog.com/2024/01/10/rm-sothebys-auctioning-scaglietti-bodied-1958-ferrari-250-testa-rossa/) (Autoblog)
- [1958 Ferrari 250 TR Testa Rossa](https://paulrussell.com/1958-ferrari-250-tr-testa-rossa/) (Paul Russell and Company)
- [Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa: The Ultimate Guide](https://www.supercars.net/blog/all-brands/ferrari/ferrari-250-testa-rossa/) (supercars.net)
- [The Most Beautiful Ferrari Ever Emerges The 1958 Ferrari 250 'Pontoon Fender' Testa Rossa](https://www.conceptcarz.com/a52661/1958-ferrari-250-pontoon-fender-testa-rossa.aspx) (conceptcarz)
- [The Fantastic Racing History of the Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa](https://www.autoevolution.com/news/the-fantastic-racing-history-of-the-ferrari-250-testa-rossa-152903.html) (autoevolution)
- [$16.39 million: 1957 Ferrari Testa Rossa sets new world record at Gooding and Company](https://www.motorsportretro.com/2011/08/1957-ferrari-testa-rossa/) (Motorsport Retro)
- [Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa Expected to Break Auction Record](https://sportscardigest.com/ferrari-250-testa-rossa-expected-to-break-auction-record/) (Sports Car Digest)
- [The History of the 1957 Ferrari Testa Rossa](https://www.classicins.com/the-history-of-the-1957-ferrari-testa-rossa/) (Classic Insurance)

Cite as: Fully Sorted, "Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa", https://fullysorted.com/research/models/ferrari/250-testa-rossa, updated 2026-09-21.