Behind the Ferrari and Lamborghini rivalry
Ferruccio Lamborghini was primarily interested in building comfortable, quick and stylish GT cars, not high performance sports cars or racing cars. In contrast, Enzo Ferrari was interested in producing road cars to fund the racing division of the company.<p>From the present-day, it&#x27;s easy to see why Lamborghini and Ferrari are &quot;paired.&quot; Both are merchandising and branding behemoths, both produce thoroughly modern, refined sports cars that are often cross-shopped against each other. However, in the 1960s and 1970s these companies were definitely not two sides of the same coin, being run by idiosyncratic personalities with differing priorities. While the Miura and Countach are best remembered today, Lamborghini struggled tremendously to break in to the luxury GT market with the 350 GT, 400 GT, Islero, Jarama and Espada. They also tried and failed to compete with the Porsche 911 using the Urraco. Economic and manufacturing issues prevented Lamborghini from achieving lasting profitability in these markets. Thus, as described in the article, Lamborghini struggled through the 70s and 80s. In contrast, Ferrari was continually buoyed by positive publicity from racing and weathered the oil crisis using funding provided by Fiat.<p>One part of the story that is glossed over by the article is the engineering team behind the early Lamborghini cars. The legendary popularity of the Miura and Countach and their crucial role in the Lamborghini story overshadow the fact that Ferruccio was not initially supportive of these cars, or of the idea of building racing-inspired high performance sports cars at all. In particular, the Miura was an &quot;after-hours&quot; project of three talented engineers: Gian Paolo Dallara, Paolo Stanzani and Bob Wallace. These three all had keen interest in racing cars and developed the Miura chassis without official support. After the completed chassis was shown at the 1966 Geneva Auto Show, favorable public response led Ferruccio to approve a production version. The success of the Miura allowed the small Lamborghini engineering team and body designer Gandini to have creative freedom in designing the Countach. However, if the company stayed true to Ferruccio&#x27;s original goals and these engineers were not allowed to &quot;play&quot;, these remarkable models would not exist at all.<p>The article&#x27;s states that ATS designed and built early Lamborghinis. This is historically inaccurate. The only ATS member that had a significant relationship with Lamborghini was Giotto Bizzarrini, who designed the V12 engine used in the 350 GT and subsequently refined and updated for use in many other Lamborghini models. Bizzarrini&#x27;s association with Lamborghini was very brief, most likely only consisting of providing the engine design as a deliverable. The four person team of Bizzarrini, Dallara, Stanzani, and Wallace were responsible for the engineering of the early Lamborghini cars, not ATS.<p>There&#x27;s also an interesting story here behind the article&#x27;s brief mention of the 1961 walkout&#x2F;&quot;palace revolt&quot; where some of the leading technical talent left Ferrari and formed ATS. While this was a blow in the short term, Ferrari very quickly filled the void with a young engineer named Mauro Forghieri who became one of the most successful technical directors in the company&#x27;s history. Enzo&#x27;s willingness to bring in new, young talent when existing employees (and drivers!) proved unsatisfactory is a major theme in the company&#x27;s history. Arguably, this tendency contributed to the company and team&#x27;s ability to stay solvent and successful for so long under Enzo&#x27;s management.