An old F1 car coming up for sale isn’t all that unusual. Usually, though, it’s a long-forgotten chassis from some outfit that, at its best, floundered around in the midfield. A car that racked up five race wins in the hands of one of the sport’s greatest-ever drivers, on the other hand? That’s a lot more unusual, but that’s just what this 2006 Ferrari 248 is.
This is chassis 254, the fifth of eight cars built by Ferrari for the 2006 season, which would prove to be Michael Schumacher’s last with the Scuderia, the announcement of his retirement coming at that year’s Italian Grand Prix. In a season where Ferrari racked up eight race wins, seven of them came from Schumacher, and five of those – at the San Marino, European, United States, French and German Grands Prix – were in this very car.
Ferrari 248 F1 – side
The first qualifying session 254 took part in, at Imola, was also a significant one: Schumacher put the car on pole, which was his 66th. That meant he surpassed the record for most career poles, previously held by Ayrton Senna. He would put chassis 254 on the top spot twice more, with his pole lap at the French Grand Prix the last of his career.
2006 – the first year where the grid (with the exception of Toro Rosso) moved away from screaming 3.0-litre V10s to only slightly less screaming 2.4-litre V8s – proved to be a tight battle between Schumacher and Fernando Alonso in the Drivers’ Championship, and Ferrari and Renault in the Constructors’.
Michael Schumacher leads Fernando Alonso at the 2006 San Marino GP
Ultimately, the Spanish driver and French constructor would take both championships by slim margins, but this doesn’t diminish the significance of one of the last Ferraris driven by the team’s most dominant driver. It’s also thought – but not confirmed – that 254 was the first ever Ferrari F1 car driven by Kimi Räikkönen, during a test in early 2007 ahead of him taking over Schumacher’s seat for that season.
At the end of 2007, it was acquired from Ferrari by a private collector, who’s owned it ever since. It’s now being offered through one of RM Sotheby’s’ ‘Sealed’ sales. Everything, including the circa 785bhp, 20,000rpm V8, is present and correct, and certified by Ferrari’s in-house Classiche department. However, despite undergoing some tests at Fiorano during its private ownership, it’s been dormant for over a decade, so whoever buys it will need to get it fully recommissioned if it’s to be anything more than a very, very expensive art piece.
Ferrari 248 F1 – detail
How expensive? We don’t know, but a Ferrari F1 that delivered five wins to, statistically, the sport’s second-most successful driver isn’t going to come cheap. For what it’s worth, last year, Lewis Hamilton’s first Mercedes F1 car sold for around £15 million. That was the second-most expensive F1 car sale ever, the top spot taken by a Fangio-driven 1954 Mercedes W196 that went for £19.7 million in 2013. It wouldn’t surprise us one bit to see this Ferrari right up in those upper echelons.
