FERRARI

Dino 246 GT-GTS

The Ferrari Dino 246 GT-GTS was named in honour of Alfredo "Dino" Ferrari, Enzo Ferrari's son, who had championed the small V6 engine before his early death. To homologate that V6 for Formula 2 racing, Ferrari needed to build a road car in volume, and so the Dino marque was created as a slightly more affordable junior line sitting below the V12 Ferraris. The aluminium-bodied Dino 206 GT of 1968 came first, but it was the Ferrari Dino 246 GT-GTS, launched in 1969, that became the icon. Styled by Pininfarina and built by Scaglietti in Modena, its sensuous curving body is still regarded as one of the most beautiful shapes ever drawn, while a longer wheelbase and a switch to steel construction made the Ferrari Dino 246 GT-GTS more usable than its rare predecessor. At its heart sat a transversely mid-mounted 2.4-litre quad-cam Dino V6 producing around 195 horsepower, giving the lightweight coupe genuine giant-killing handling and a top speed near 245 km/h. From 1972 a removable-roof GTS Spyder joined the fixed-head GT, and the cars ran through three series, totalling 2,295 GT coupes and 1,274 GTS targas for 3,569 examples in all. Long dismissed by purists because it never wore a Ferrari badge, the Ferrari Dino 246 GT-GTS has been fully embraced as a true Ferrari, and is now one of the most desirable classics of its era.