Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico: cheating the wind

By Aaron McKay

| 6 Jun 2025

Classic & Sports Car – Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico: cheating the wind

Air appears to glide over every line, with only the headlights piercing through an upswept flow that falls so easily, so rapidly away from a glassy fastback.

Sculpted vents for the disc brakes, near-flush doorhandles and curiously rounded sides help it evade resistance to speed from every dimension.

And yet Pininfarina’s Ferrari 250GT Coupé Aerodinamico probably never saw the inside of a wind tunnel.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s rear vents, in Superfast III style

Aerodynamic efficiency was still in its infancy as the jet-age fascination grew with the evolving landscape of transport and a luxury was made of time.

Into these chromium visions of speed drove Ferrari’s first road cars, with the finest pens of Turin and Milan sketching bodies to match.

Soon, appetites grew for special designs that spoke of new angles of attack on the world’s fast-expanding highway networks, none more so than in the United States.

‘Enzo was keen to satisfy a request from a well-known figure for a short-wheelbase 250GT coupé in the Superamerica style’

Upon a series of big-block 4.1- and 4.5-litre V12-powered Ferrari 340, 342 and 375 America models, built for the cream of importer Luigi Chinetti’s client crop, arrived dramatic creations that tried to make something elegant of the mid-’50s fashion for aircraft-inspired nosecones and fins.

The incongruous wings of Pininfarina’s 1956 Superfast and the Batmobile-aping result of a Ghia/Chrysler collaboration in the same year showed just how far the imagination could go – and perhaps shouldn’t have gone.

Aldo Brovarone was the man at Pininfarina responsible for smoothing over these aberrations of sharks on Ferrari chassis, relieving them with the 1960 Superfast II at the Turin motor show.

The sensational and slippery Ferrari 250GT Coupé Aerodinamico

The young designer had arrived at the carrozzeria from Cisitalia in 1952, having found an outlet in automotive form for his fascination with aircraft.

Lending his hand to the lozenge-like 1953-’60 Alfa Romeo 6C-3000CM Superflow designs, his first full project at Pininfarina granted another vast canopy of glass to a 1955 Ferrari 375 America built for Fiat boss Gianni Agnelli.

With the Superfast II, Brovarone distilled his ideas into a simple profile inspired by an aircraft wing.

It was followed up in 1962 with the Superfast III, featuring slimmed roof pillars and pop-up headlights; following that, the similar IV previewed the Ferrari 330GT’s quad-headlight treatment.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s trimmed bonnet

The series would prove to be exceptionally popular among customers of Superamerica models, with Pininfarina fitting what it described as its Coupé Aerodinamico body to 32 of the 47 4-litre Ferrari 400 Superamericas built between 1959 and ’64, as well as becoming the default shape of the 500 Superfast.

Never daring to be short of a show car, the carrozzeria had also displayed a Coupé Aerodinamico based on a 3-litre 250GT at the 1959 Geneva Salon, thus combining this progressive bodywork style with the more tax-friendly mechanical set-up for European buyers.

That the uptake was very low – just three private orders – was probably less to do with the desire for one of these sleek fashion statements than with the costs and inherent exclusivity of deviating from wider moves into series production at Ferrari and Pininfarina.

The Ferrari’s Borrani wheels conceal disc brakes at every corner

So it was that Sergio Pininfarina wrote to Enzo Ferrari in January 1962, suggesting that he was very keen to satisfy a request from a well-known figure in Turin for a special short-wheelbase 250GT in the Superamerica style.

It had already been a year since Ferdinando Gatta had received an initial invoice for 5,500,000 lire, stipulating simply a 250GT 2+2 with overdrive, disc brakes and leather interior – plus the understanding that costs may rise.

And they would, to more than 7,350,000 lire, once the bodywork style had been agreed.

Known as ‘Duccio’, Gatta was close to the Lancia family not only in a professional capacity, as its head of service assistance from 1943-’44 and as director of the Lancia Turin Branch from 1947-’51, but also as the son-in-law of Adele Lancia, founder Vincenzo’s sister.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s sculpted lines

A keen car enthusiast, he dabbled in motorsport with a Zagato-bodied Lancia B20 GT, including works drives and a notable win in the 1955 Sestriere Rally – a run from the lowlands to the eponymous mountain pass in the Piedmont.

His corporate ties to Lancia dissolved after the control of the firm was passed from its founders to Carlo Pesenti in 1958 – Duccio was reportedly the only heir who had not wanted to sell up – so he turned his attention to his own dealership, Italcar SpA.

Reflective either of shifting loyalties or the personal wealth generated by his own business, the 43-year-old took delivery of his special Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico later in 1962, sending a letter of thanks to Enzo.

The Ferrari’s chassis plate is a record of the 3-litre Tipo 168 engine

He wrote: ‘I learned from my friend Sergio Pininfarina, excellent and courteous ambassador of my desires, that you agreed to give me a Super America [SWB] chassis equipped with a 3-litre engine.

‘I am grateful for this exception to custom, which I particularly appreciated.’

It was an exception that had been made only five times for the Ferrari 250GT, with all but one of these 3-litre, short-wheelbase Berlinetta Esperimentale models in the Aerodinamico style.

The first was, curiously, a Prototipo Sperimentale lightweight built by Scaglietti: chassis 2643GT served as the design and engineering testbed for the 250GTO, raced at Le Mans and driven to a class win at the 1962 Daytona 3 Hours by Stirling Moss.

‘At these speeds, the tension in the tightly damped chassis keeps the Ferrari 250GT in check but also on its toes’

The first of the Pininfarina road cars was chassis 2429GT, which went to France, followed by 2613GT for Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands, then a more subtly bodied, long-wheelbase 2821GT for the 1961 London Motor Show.

‘Our’ car, chassis 3615GT, arrived with Duccio as the final Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico.

Like most of its siblings, 3615GT used the 2400mm wheelbase, as had the earlier Ferrari 400 Superamericas before the 1962 Series 2’s 2600mm chassis, most noticeable in the narrowed distance between the door and rear wheelarch.

It featured a flat, oval grille, first seen on Prince Bernhard’s Superfast-inspired Ferrari 250GT, over a low-set single front bumper, plus an additional pair of the Superfast III’s rear-wing vents behind the front wheels.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s V12 engine makes c300bhp

Although shy of the 300bhp-plus power output advertised for the 4-litre V12s destined for the American market, the 3-litre Tipo 168s that were fitted to all of the 250GT specials (except 2821GT) were of a particularly lively disposition.

Being the last of its kind, Duccio’s car featured the later 168/61 unit, with slightly larger-diameter valves to go with its road-spec Tipo 128 camshafts, six-branch-intake head and three Weber carburettors.

No doubt Duccio enjoyed access to all kinds of Lancias and Ferraris – Italcar appears to have had a penchant for supplying the Dino 206 and 246GT, another Aldo Brovarone masterpiece.

However, he chose to spend many hours behind the wheel of his 250GT Coupé Aerodinamico, accruing 42,000km by May 1965, and a further 5000km by October of the same year.

The Ferrari’s bonnet intake feeds three Weber carburettors

This flash of insight is the little we know of the car’s use in Duccio’s hands, for those mileage stamps were taken at the factory during servicing just before the car was sold – presumably its routine maintenance had been done on Italcar ramps.

In April 1966 it ventured eastwards, to its next custodian in the province of Alessandria, before returning to Turin with its third owner the following year.

Inevitably it emigrated to the United States, via Luigi Chinetti, in 1972, and then on to a succession of owners along the West Coast until 1977, when a sortie through residences in Texas and Michigan concluded with a return to California for the end of the 1980s.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s joint logo features Prancing Horse and Pininfarina flags

From its original Grigio Marrone Italver, it had been repainted white, then dark blue, and its Tipo 168 V12 had been replaced with a 250GTE 2+2-spec Tipo 128, which, at least according to those advertising it for sale, had enjoyed a number of mechanical overhauls.

Appropriately for a car that cost more than a Ferrari 250GT California Spider when new, the Coupé Aerodinamico was never a cheap Ferrari.

In the early 1990s, this niche exotic found few bidders with large enough pockets, either from the classifieds in the USA or at a Brooks auction in London.

Eventually it was secured into the collection of Fabrizio Violati, where it would stay until after the racing driver’s death in 2010.

‘Appetites grew for special designs that spoke of new angles of attack on the world’s fast-expanding highway networks’

Its current owner, William Heinecke, captured the special Ferrari in 2014 at Bonhams’ Quail Lodge auction, for $6,875,000, as a Maranello star in his collection of extraordinary one-offs that range from a bespoke Maserati Ghibli to the Jaguar XK120 Supersonic.

He tracked down what is thought to be the original engine, which had emerged separately in the United States in the ’80s, and instigated a full restoration with renowned Dutch specialist Strada e Corsa.

It emerged in 2023 to dazzle the concours circuit, particularly now that it finally has a colour that does its dramatic bodywork justice: the contemporary shade of Nocciola Metallizzato.

This Ferrari’s passenger-side air vents and blue pull-knobs are unusual

The Ferrari shimmers in low light and glows in the sun, shifting between amber and russet as the angles of its aerodynamic dreams are revealed.

Unashamedly generous chrome brightwork continues on the other side of its thick, contoured doors: on the sills, the seat frames and even set into the leather-topped dashboard.

The non-standard binnacle is to be expected of a Ferrari 250GT built to order, but more unusual is the rather abrupt, slanted centre console with blue pull-knobs for its auxiliary controls.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s rear luggage straps

It also includes two rocker switches for the electric windows – perhaps more than just a 1960s novelty, given that two passenger-side air vents have also been specified.

Maybe some of Duccio’s kilometres were into the still heat of Emilia-Romagna.

Due to the short wheelbase and how far the V12 has been set back in the chassis, the centre console invades further into the cabin, which becomes even more cosy thanks to the transmission-tunnel armrest and an oddly bulbous shroud for the steering column – all in the finest leather.

If it weren’t for the large, wood-rimmed three-spoke wheel ahead, the feeling of peering out from an intimidatingly expensive Italian handbag would be complete.

The firing order of the Ferrari V12 is neatly noted

The Colombo V12 awakens with a soft, melodic thumping that takes a moment to settle in idling pitch as the triple Webers find their footing.

The gearlever requires a firm hand and the clutch is highly sprung, but both are smooth and co-operative, and only a tickle of revs is needed to move forward.

Torque swells quickly beyond the purpose of first gear, and an appetite for speed builds as temperature rises in the dials and the drivetrain limbers up.

Power meets fine balance in the Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s chassis

Over the deep dashboard, the wraparound ’screen guides scenery around the rest of its generous window area, interrupted only by the thin pillars made necessary for reducing wind noise from the glass-to-glass joins ventured by the Superfast III.

There’s still a light rustling, perhaps from fresh seals settling into place.

Sitting on a wide, plump leather seat, the sense of space and the bodywork falling away from you is a relief in a driving position that can feel a little cramped for those approaching 6ft tall.

It seems to slip away further as you stir the V12 forward on its long-travel throttle.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico has rich chrome detailing and thick seals on its front quarterlights

The three Webers draw a rich intake of breath to overlay a tenor percussion that holds the same magical key as it turns creamy-smooth towards 6000rpm.

In one long, effortless stride, third gear consumes a surprisingly large chunk of the 300kph speedometer, before the cams subtly tail off and suggest the next gear.

The engine, redoubtable and insatiable in its desire for action, wants nothing more than to carry on howling towards the horizon.

The Ferrari’s inset tail-lights are a Coupé Aerodinamico feature

At these intercontinental speeds, the tension in the tightly damped chassis keeps the 250GT in check but also on its toes, with a delicate feeling in the steering that’s tied closely to the pivot point of the short wheelbase.

You worry that it’s nervous, but the more you steer with faith, the more it rewards with surefooted responses from the rear axle.

The brakes are just as good at keeping such speeds in check.

Its four-wheel discs rarely feel overwhelmed, although whether or not they stay extra cool thanks to the trick ducts is difficult to say.

This classic Ferrari’s short wheelbase is hinted at in the gap from the door to the rear wheelarch

Hauled down to a second-gear corner, the weight of the glorious V12 remains a task for the front axle to overcome, despite how far back it appears to have been mounted under the bonnet.

Lean too much on the middle pedal into a corner and the steering quickly fills with heft, becoming vulnerable to kickback over bumps while the 185-section Pirelli Cinturatos lean into understeer.

But scrub off the speed and guide the nose in early, and the short-wheelbase 250GT balances beautifully on the throttle as the rear axle stays resolutely true to the directions issued for the nearest straight.

A smooth, measured slot into third gear and it grapple-hooks the horizon once again, with Ferrari’s glorious 12-cylinder ode to speed feeling especially potent inside Pininfarina’s superfast dream.

The Ferrari 250GT SWB Coupé Aerodinamico’s low-set front bumper and wing scallops differentiate chassis 3615GT from its stablemates

With the fields blurring past as if inside a running oil painting of gold, I leave the aspirations of fourth gear behind, instead letting the car settle into a contented canter through the countryside, imagining that Ferdinando ‘Duccio’ Gatta wouldn’t have always been trying to tear the atmosphere apart in the interests of time.

With the V12 humming along and the dials calmly reporting on a fast cruise, there must have come the realisation that, despite the ambitions of an era obsessed with getting there as quickly as possible, he had already arrived.

Images: Max Edleston

Thanks to: The Light Car Company

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