Leftfield Swiss designer Franco Sbarro’s custom Ferrari speedster was a 1990s auto show star and is now for sale
by Chris Chilton
9 hours ago
- A curvy speedster based on a chopped-down Testarossa is for sale in Germany.
- The 1987 flat-12 Ferrari was modified by legendary car builder Franco Sbarro.
- Sbarro made three cars but this example is the only one ever road-registered.
Supercar speedsters were all the rage at the dawn of the 2020s, McLaren, Aston Martin and Ferrari all dreaming up windshield-less two-seaters created by taking a knife to their existing more practical models. But one Ferrari owner commissioned a build that predicted the exact same trend almost 30 years before it happened, and the result is the craziest Testarossa you’ve ever seen, and one that is now for sale.
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Its crisp lines, boxy nose and hips, and industrial-looking side strakes make the Ferrari Testarossa one of the cars that defined the 1980s, but by the following decade tastes had changed and one Testarossa owner embarked on a bold update plan with the help of bonkers Swiss designer Franco Sbarro.
A Radically Reimagined Testarossa
Sbarro and his team shortened the Ferrari’s chassis and clothed the truncated floorpan with contemporary curvy bodywork and fitted scissors, something no Ferrari of the time had. There was no windshield, not even a cut-down racing screen, but rollover protection was provided by an eye-catching pair of fat tubes that also funnel air from the headlight openings to the rear of the car.
Strangely, the air appears to besent straight out the back of the car, rather than fed to the 4.9-liter flat-12 engine that was retained from the donor Testarossa. Rated at 385 hp (390 PS) when new, the 180-degree V12 is hooked up to a five-speed manual transmission complete with a classic open-gate metal shift quadrant, and road and engine speeds are shown on a stock gauge cluster relocated to the center of the dash.
Thiesen Berlin GmbH
Shown Once, Then Tucked Away
Sbarro showed the car on the International stage in 1995 and even now, three decades on, it’s an arresting sight, beautiful from some angles, and ungainly from others. There are definite hints of McLaren in the flanks and the transparent doors, and the seats are also molded directly into the car, just like on many modern hypercars.
Three cars were built, Classic Driver reports, but this is the only example that was ever registered for road use. It’s now for sale out of Germany, price on application. You can check out the advert here.
Thiesen Berlin GmbH
#Ferrari #Testarossa #Coachbuilt #DustBuster
