Ferrari 375 MM Berlinetta

375 MM Berlinetta at a glance

From the 340 MM and the Formula One V12

Ferrari named several sports cars after the Mille Miglia, and the 375 MM followed the 340 MM of 1953. Its engine came from the 375 Formula One single-seater. Aurelio Lampredi designed this "long-block" V12, which was larger and heavier than Gioacchino Colombo's earlier unit.

For the sports car, Ferrari fitted a new crankshaft with a shorter 68 mm stroke and a larger bore. Ferrari's own history page notes that the enlarged engine first raced in a 340 berlinetta at Le Mans in 1953, driven by Alberto Ascari and Luigi Villoresi. The road-going counterpart of the racer was the 375 America.

Four of the 26 cars were converted from 340 MM chassis. One of them, 0320AM, had raced at Le Mans with a 4.1-litre engine and was then enlarged to 4.5 litres and rebodied. The mixture of conversions and new chassis is one reason why sources give slightly different counts for each body style.

Pinin Farina berlinettas and the Turin show car

Pinin Farina bodied 24 of the 26 cars. According to the chassis table on English Wikipedia, the series included 14 spiders, ten Pinin Farina berlinettas and two coupés. Vignale built one spider, and Ghia built one coupé.

The berlinetta body was derived from Pinin Farina's design for the 250 MM. RM Sotheby's describes how 0320AM later received a more streamlined nose with recessed, covered headlamps, and a smaller rear window in place of the wraparound glass. Apart from the badges and the body maker's emblem, these cars carry almost no chrome.

The old version of this page mixed up the series with the Turin show car of 1955. The figure of 26 cars covers every 375 MM, not just the closed cars. The story of the Rossellini car is told in our page on the 375 MM Coupé Scaglietti.

Inside the racing berlinetta

The cabin is built for long road races rather than comfort. Earlier descriptions of the car mention right-hand drive, which was usual for Ferrari's racing cars of the period, a three-spoke wheel, a speedometer marked to 300 km/h and a rev counter reading to 8,000 rpm. The rear-view mirror sits on the dashboard, and folding sun visors were fitted above the windscreen.

A box-shaped air intake sits on a removable bonnet panel rather than on a hinged bonnet. Side vents behind the front wheels release hot air from the engine bay. These details varied from car to car, because many berlinettas were modified during their racing lives.

Lampredi V12 and chassis data

By our calculation, the 375 MM carries about 3.6 kg per kW in dry form. That is better than the roughly 4 kg per kW of the four-cylinder 750 Monza that followed in 1954, using our figures of 191 kW and about 760 kg. Try other figures in the power-to-weight calculator, or convert PS, hp and kW with the power converter.

Racing record, 1953–1954

The berlinettas raced alongside the spiders, and Ferrari often entered both at the same event. The main results below cover the whole 375 MM family.

The Spa and Nürburgring wins counted towards the 1953 World Sportscar Championship, the first season of that series. After the 4.9-litre 375 Plus arrived in 1954, the 375 MM scored no more championship points for the works team.

Le Mans 1953 and three world champions

Chassis 0320AM shows how hard these cars were used. At Le Mans in 1953 it ran as number 14 for Hawthorn and Farina and was second after 12 laps. The team then topped up its brake fluid during a stop, which the rules did not allow, and the car was disqualified.

Two months later the same car won the Pescara 12 Hours. In the Carrera Panamericana, Maglioli took over from Mario Ricci and set a stage record at an average of 138 mph, about 222 km/h, over 223 miles, roughly 359 km. RM Sotheby's calls it the only works racer driven in the World Sportscar Championship by three world champions: Hawthorn, Ascari and Farina.

Compared with the 375 Plus and the 250 GT TdF

Compared with the later 250 GT Tour de France, the 375 MM has 50 % more displacement and comes from an era when Ferrari still sold almost pure racing cars to private owners. The GT car that followed is described in our page on the 250 GT Berlinetta Tour de France.

Collecting a 375 MM Berlinetta

Almost every surviving car has a documented chassis history, which is essential because many were rebuilt. At RM Sotheby's Villa Erba sale in 2013, berlinetta 0320AM sold for €9,856,000. In the same year the spider 0364AM was reported sold for 9 million US dollars, about €6.8 million at the time. Points to check:

• Chassis and engine numbers: matching numbers, as on 0320AM, add a lot of value.
• Conversions: whether the car started as a 340 MM, and which body it wore in period.
• Restorations: earlier rebuilds sometimes changed the nose, the rear window or the wheel-arch vents.
• Race history: works entries at Le Mans, Spa or the Carrera Panamericana must be backed by period records.