December 2, 2025 • 39 mins
In this episode of the Ferrari Marketplace Podcast, William Ross from the Exotic Car Marketplace discusses the legendary Ferrari 250 GTO "Bianco Speciale", with a special focus on chassis 3729GT, the only white GTO ever produced. Guests Sam Murtaugh from Mecum Auctions and Chris Miele from the Prancing Horse of Nashville join to explore the unique history, specifications, and modifications of this rare car. The conversation covers its racing pedigree, ownership history, and upcoming auction at Mecum’s Kissimmee event. The podcast also delves into auction logistics and the significance of showcasing high-value cars like the GTO. Additionally, the episode highlights the broader Mecum auction experience, including entertainment, events, and logistics. The hosts emphasize the importance of documentation and the evolving nature of collector car sales, framing the upcoming auction as a historic moment in the Ferrari collector market.
===== (Oo---x---oO) =====
00:00 Deep Dive into the Ferrari 250 GTO; Unique Features of Chassis 3729 GT 01:25 Discussion with Guests: Sam Murtaugh and Chris Miele 01:54 Right-Hand Drive and Color Rarity 03:23 Interior and Modifications 08:22 Racing History and Ownership 13:41 Restoration and Certification 18:20 Documentation and Provenance 19:03 The Red Book and Ownership History 19:29 The Evolution of Mecum Kissimmee Auction 21:05 Organizing the Auction Days 23:47 Entertainment and Activities at the Auction 24:49 The Role of Social Media and Broadcasting 25:41 The Story Behind the Cars 26:25 The Ferrari Collection at Kissimmee 26:49 The GTO and Its Journey to Auction 33:04 Preparing for the Auction 35:46 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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On Ferrari Friday's, William Ross from the Exotic Car Marketplace will be discussing all things Ferrari and interviewing people that live and breathe the Ferrari brand. Topics range from road cars to racing; drivers to owners, as well as auctions, private sales and trends in the collector market. Copyright William Ross, Exotic Car Marketplace a division of Sixty5 Motorsports. This episode is part of our Motoring Podcast Network and has been republished with permission.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
As part of Ferrari Fridays, WilliamRoss from the Exotic Car Marketplace
will be discussing all things Ferrariand interviewing people that live
and breathe The Ferrari brand.
Topics range from road cars toracing drivers to owners, as well
as auctions, private sales andtrends in the collector market.
Never, never.
(00:28):
Welcome to the FerrariMarketplace Podcast.
Today we're gonna take a deep diveinto the legend itself, the Ferrari
two 50 GTO with only 36 ever built.
The GTO sits the top of thecollector car market with its
racing pedigree, unmatched beauty.
Its history with some of themotorsports most prolific drivers.
It is the ultimate expressionof Ferrari's 1960s.
(00:49):
Racing dominance.
But today we're not justgonna talk about any GTO.
We're specifically gonna talkabout chassis 3 7 2 9 gt.
This is the only two 50 GTO that left thefactory in Bianco's, Speciale, or for us
that don't speak Italian, that's white.
We believe it might have been at therequest of John Coons being that he
was British and didn't wanna have ared car, but one of my guests might
(01:09):
be able to delve into that a smidge.
And for now though, but the firsttime in, geez, multiple decades,
this GTO is coming to auction.
Specifically, it's gonna becoming to Mecca's Kissame Auction
in January, the world's largestcollector car auction event today.
Joining me also on this is gonnabe Sam Murtaugh, COO of Meum
Auctions, and Chris Neely fromthe Prancing Horse of Nashville.
(01:32):
So gentlemen, welcome to the show.
Thank you.
Thank you.
So let's just jump rightinto the car itself.
This specific GTO, there's somereally great specifics about this
car that make, in my opinion, one ofthe more collectible ones of the 36.
You know, I mean obviously all of 'emare collectible, but you know, there's
some really good specifics about thiscar itself that I think makes it kind
of stand out from the other ones.
(01:54):
It's just one of eightright hand drive cars.
My opinion outta 36 1 8, that kind ofmakes it a little bit more special.
Chris, what are your thoughts on that?
Being one of only eightright hand drive cars.
Obviously it was sold to a UK owner,so the cars are right hand drive.
It's the car that he preferred to have.
I mean, they're just used to it.
For us in the states, it's a little oddfor us, but I mean, right hand drive cars
(02:14):
are super desirable in certain markets.
One right hand drive cars, which obviouslyshrinks the rarity from 36 down to
eight, but the fact that this is paintedwhite, it is the only one painted white
from the factory, basically being theonly one, regardless of the right hand
drive, the only one painted white ofthe whole group is the most powerful
piece of this car from my perspective.
I mean, whether it's right or lefthand drive, whatever you like, but
(02:36):
the fact that it's the only one inwhite, that is the spectacular fact
to me, from a rarity standpoint.
I agree.
I think it looks spectacular andwhite myself, that's for sure.
Yep.
Makes it stand out.
And especially the fact that, you know,you had a lot of 'em that have been
repainted different colors and that, butthis day and age, it's always good to
have it go back to its factory color,being that one of one, you'll know which
special car you have out of all of them.
No, no question.
(02:57):
I mean, if you wanna stand out in a leadcrowd of which, of being an owner of
A GTO, what you at the, you know, thehighest of the pedestal, but to have the
only one in white and to stand out inwhite, I mean it, to see, it, it just, the
white color in that car and the lines inthat car, it's, it's, it's spectacular.
Most definitely, definitely.
Now.
Do we know specifically whythat left a factory in white?
(03:17):
Was it at the request of cos?
I believe so, yes.
At least wasn't green, butwhite looks very nice on it.
Another great thing, or I guess,special, unique thing about this
car itself is everyone that isfamiliar with the nose, GTOs.
They all think they have blue interior.
That car actually came with the, fromthe factory in with the black interior?
(03:37):
No, it came with a blue interior, butwhen it immediately was delivered in
period with the number 10 on it, it wasthe car that was run by Graham Hill.
From the best of my knowledge, I believethat the car had the black seats, and that
was only weeks after the car was deliver.
So I think that's what they changed up onit when the car got delivered to the uk.
Wondering why they would do that soquickly, switching from the blue.
(03:58):
Well, did all the, uh, GTOscome blue and black or was there
another color else came in?
No, there was a few different colors.
There was some thatwere delivered with red.
There was some that weredelivered with green.
There was even black interiors.
It was just something at the time theyused almost like a Nomex type material.
So the driver wanted to slide around inhis, in his overalls, in his racing suit.
It was almost like a vinyl on the sidesthat was used on the side bolsters.
(04:21):
But the seats are very, very, verysmall seat that's in that car.
It's super easy to retrim and put,you know, whatever color you want
it, but I'm assuming that Coombs,that was his look, his livery that
he had was white with black 'causeit was obviously requested that way.
But anyone out there listeningknows why they did it so quickly.
Shoot me a message 'causewe'd like to know if we get an
(04:41):
answer that that'd be fantastic.
But, uh, that's good to know.
'cause I always, I think of bluewhen I think of GTO on the interior,
something that would stand out.
But black, white, interior, fantastic.
Coombs actually being a Jaguar guysent the car over to Jaguar for them
to guess reverse engineer it, to tryand get their Jaguar up to speed.
'cause the GTO was so fast.
(05:01):
What do we know about that little story?
'cause it's never been confirmed,but it's kind of pretty well known.
Coombs, you know, was.
As Chris mentioned, he was British andyou know, obviously was, was heavy into
the associate with Jaguar and, and it saidthat Jaguar engineers wanted to get their
hands on that to figure out what's goingon, why, what's making this car so great.
And to be able to have an opportunitywith the relationship with Coombs and,
(05:22):
and get their hands on, on a GTO to, youknow, looking into that car and, and.
Figuring out what they could use from thatto prototype their lightweight e types.
Coombs did a few special things tokind of, I wanna say differentiate.
I don't know if make it better.
What did Coombs do to the car itself?
Do I guess, in his mind, improve it?
Coombs, I believe, put the increasedcooling in it, so the third vent.
Most of the cars havethe two vents on 'em.
(05:43):
This car has three vents on the righthand side and he made some other small
modifications to the car 'cause he wasobviously competing with the car and
they were showing the car and runningit everywhere they could in the uk.
The louvers on the hood I believewas something cos added and I think
air ducts in the front, I think hereplaced those fog lights and made
those functional air, I believe.
I'm not mistaken, he didmake some small ones.
There's a photo of the car withGraham Hill running the car and
(06:06):
it's got the three vents on it.
So you know, it was definitely a threevent car originally because there's
other photos when you look at it.
The green one that I mentionedto you, that it was actually a
little bit earlier car, and there'scars that were later than it that
actually had the two vents as well.
So there had to be a point withti when they went ahead and they
built the body on these cars.
It had to be a request, but it wasn'tsomething that Coombs, you gotta be clear
(06:30):
about that, that it was added afterwards.
There's a few of them that havethe three vents on the side.
There are a few cars that havethe three vents because you can
clearly see it in the photo.
They had those three ventholes in the front, but.
There's other ones that were inthe bonnet and you know, cars had,
you know, different things in them.
This car, uh, it hasn't been modified.
(06:51):
This is the way that this car was ordered.
The vents on the hood onthe front or in the nose.
Can you open and close those?
Yes.
In motion?
No, not in motion.
No.
You just go ahead and they have.
Quick fasteners on 'emand you just put 'em in.
So they obviously did it for coolingbecause if they don't want the car to
run too hot or obviously too cool atLamont specifically, or, and a lot of
the other tracks back then, they had alot of very long straits and obviously
(07:13):
aerodynamics come into play, wasn't it?
Early cars, they came to the conclusionor realized that it was having a
lot of nose lift at higher speeds.
Yeah.
That's when the early days of aerodynamicswere really starting to kick in and
they started to figure out, we gottago ahead and keep this car cool or hot.
But you know, the more openings thatyou have on a car, the more it slows
it down because that's just thatmuch more error that's not slipping
(07:35):
over the car, it's going into it.
It's kind of the balancingact at that point.
If you look at the grill on atwo 50 GTO, it's quite small.
Yeah.
And as a sidebar, when you look atthe car, like the 2 75 car, the hen
car, the the sister car to Dana's car.
During the race, they had to getwire snipers in 65 and cut a giant
hole in the front of the car justto get more air into the car.
(07:55):
And that's really thesuccessor to the two 50 GTL.
Always keep in mind that, you know,yes, you could drive 'em on the
street, but these were race cars.
That's what they werebuilt for back in the day.
It was to compete.
People would sit there andlook how minimalist the
interior is and what it's got.
It doesn't have any creature comforts.
This thing had one purpose andthat was to go fast and win races,
extra cooling, everything would becritical back then too, especially.
(08:18):
Front engine V 12 is gonna need tobreathe as much as it possibly can.
Sure.
This car's really, it's never been,I wanna say wrecked, but I mean it
might've had a ding or two or hereor there, but it's never had anything
of serious consequence where quarterpanels, all this stuff had to get
replaced or anything like that.
Pretty solid as an original car.
Right?
Well, Mike Parks had an accident withit in 63, which is well documented.
(08:41):
You know, it had its battle scars and,and the way that it worked, if you
were racing for Ferrari, if you weren'tpushing the car right to the very edge.
You were no longer gonna be aracing driver for Enzo Ferrari.
It was first or nothing with them.
You know, it didn't, it wasn't,you know, second or third place,
they weren't satisfied with that.
It was win at all costs and thedrivers put the cars to their limits
(09:02):
and they pushed 'em right to the edge.
And sometimes they went alittle bit over the edge.
But to your point where you mentionedearlier, was it completely in an
accident, some of the other GTOshave had some catastrophic crashes.
No, this car didn't it,it was raced in period.
It had its battle scars.
As they say, structurally,the cars is sound.
And it's, you know, the, theway that the car always was.
(09:23):
Yeah.
That's fantastic.
Some of these have been, I would say,damage bound recognition, but you know,
they have some significant damage andhaving something that's that original
close original is fantastic as well.
For sure.
Let's get into specifically 37 2 9 GT Ferrari, two 50 GTO
in the, uh, build sequence.
When was this one built?
Number 12.
Okay.
So they had some, I guess you wouldsay testing or I'd say racing done
(09:46):
prior to that one being built.
So they probably modified that afterknowing that that needed more cooling.
Yeah, and it, and it's funny, on themost part, the cars were all the same.
One of them has a different differential.
Two of them actually have a differentdifferential in them, and then
there's some that, you know, havea stripe on 'em, which is noted
obviously originally how it left.
But this was the third one for the uk.
(10:07):
So I believe it's the third right handdrive car, at least what I'm seeing here.
It's number 12.
Most of 'em are Rosana,but some of them are.
Rosa Corsa is what it shows here,which I don't know if that's a
screw up in the computer or not.
I didn't know that that wasactually a color at any point
until way, way later racing red.
Oh no, it actually, no, no, no.
It is though.
I see another car with it as well.
(10:28):
I see three cars with it.
Yeah.
It's quite unique.
This car.
But it's definitely, when Ilook at this car, 3 7 2 9, it's
the 12th one that was produced.
You know, one thing that I think isvery special too, and what's great
about this car is the long-termownership history that this car's had.
Chris, can you touch on that a little bit?
Regarding to basically just only areally a couple owners, Jack Sears had
(10:51):
the car from 1970 all the way to 19.
99. I mean, he had a, along ownership with the car.
That's when John Shirleypurchased the vehicle.
30 years is impressive forkeeping a car of that nature's.
What did he buy that car for?
I, it wasn't all that much backin, what was it, 71, he bought it.
Oh yeah.
So in 1971, that car probablyat the absolute most, would've
(11:13):
been probably 10 to $15,000.
I know that the Nick Mason car was sold.
For about 35 to $40,000 from RonaldStern to Nick Mason in 1978 or 79,
I'd say in the early seventies, it wasprobably somewhere around 15, maybe
20,000, somewhere in the neighborhood.
So it's, it's quite the investmentwhen you really look at it.
(11:35):
Yeah, a little bit.
Yeah, that's a nice return.
You know, and I, A little side story,Nick Mason utilized his car's collateral
to fund, it was the mid eightiesPink Floyd reunion tour, whatever.
They put that up as collateral,I dunno, it was like a million
bucks or something like that tobe able to pay for their tour.
That came back tenfoldjust on the tour alone.
So that's always kind of aninching little story at that.
(11:55):
Great story after.
Sure.
Yeah.
John Shirley got the car in 1999.
John, I believe at that pointin time was only shortly
thereafter, he was still working.
You know, he was the former CEO ofMicrosoft and he got the vehicle
and he used it quite a bit.
I mean, he took it toall the Caino classics.
He took it to the Monterey Historic Races.
(12:17):
I mean, he really, really had a lotof fun with the car and showed it
off, and everyone, as Sam mentioned,knew it as the white Ferrari, GTO.
It's a real special car and obviously,uh, John was heavily involved with,
you know, a lot of other things that hedid at Pebble Beach as far as showing
other vehicles and doing Concor events.
So he is a well-known name,so he did it from all sides.
(12:38):
He was not only showing cars, hewas doing track days with cars and
heavily involved with doing everything,even involved obviously with Froy
class CK, getting the car certified.
With Ferrari Classic K. He's been anoutstanding caretaker and obviously we can
see for multiple decades, which is great.
Then the previous owner of that, JackSears, you know, he had it for 20 plus
(12:59):
years himself, which was great to see,and they thoroughly enjoyed the car.
If you look at the history on that racinghistorics and everything like that,
that car was out there in the publicbeauty in motion, I guess you could say.
I mean, it's just a fantastic car.
Chris, you touched on, you know, thecar's obviously got its red book.
It's got the classic case certification.
That's Ferrari going through and saying,yes, this is how this car came from the
factory for this auction itself coming up.
(13:21):
What would need to be done orwhat gets done to the car itself,
especially a car at that level,getting it ready for the auction.
What gets done prior to the auction,John, he has his own gentleman
that works for him, Fred, and theyreally take care of all the cars.
The cars are extremely well maintained.
The whole collection that he has.
And this car in particular, obviouslywas no different than any other one.
(13:41):
That being said, when Johnfirst had the car, it was red.
When he first purchasedthe car, it was red.
And then in 2008, I believe the cargot the classic case certification
and that's when they went ahead andthey, Ferrari made a new engine block.
That was installed in the car and it hasthe designation on there, the internal
number, 2300 slash 62 EE for Echo,which designates that it is a GTO motor,
(14:05):
which is done right from the factory.
So at some point early in itslife, the engine was replaced.
It was a two 50 short wheelbase competency on engine
that was put in for some time.
Then there was a two 50 GTEengine that was put in, but
right now it has the properspecification motor that's in there.
From the factory.
So the car was mechanicallymaintained, but it was never restored.
(14:27):
The car is still not a completeframe wall for restoration.
John had the car, it was Red John usedthe gentleman, I believe Butch Denison
did the car up in Washington Stateand he brought the car back to white.
But initially, John Shirley wasn'tconvinced to make the car white.
It was the guys at Ferrari Classic K.
It was actually Marco Origi whoreally pressed the issue with him.
(14:48):
And then sure enough, John paintedthe car in 2016, I believe, and
then the first time it came outwas at Windsor Castle in the uk.
And that's when you know the bigpuff was, Hey, there's a white GTO.
Because for many, many, many,many years, the car was red.
I don't think a lot of people knew, andthe internet isn't what it is today.
I mean, every year it seems like theinternet evolves and there was no
(15:10):
ai, you know, unless you went aheadand scrubbed it and found photos.
Many of the photos that you found werefrom very, very early in the days.
But for a good period of its time, thecar was red and now it's back to the
original way that it left the factory,which is white in the collector car world.
There was that period where itwas like basically restored to
better than new, not so much.
Really follow, Hey, thisis not left the factory.
Then all of a sudden we went into the barnfinds and everything, but then all of a
(15:32):
sudden, hey, let's go back to originality.
It's fantastic.
He did that, went back to the whiteand he got talked into or convinced
that, hey, that's the way to go.
And obviously it turned out I thinkit was an excellent choice 'cause
it just stands out from the restbecause you get it all lined up.
Red, red, black, just onewhite one, stick it in there.
So I mean it's, it's great to see for surewhen you look at the list and you look at
the original colors from the factory, youknow there's some obviously silvers green.
(15:55):
But to your point, primarily ena, Imean most of 'em are red mentioned, the
engine block it and recast and lookingat description, what you guys have that
that's coming with another motor, correct?
Yeah.
The engine that Chris describedis in the car and, and there's a
spare motor that will come with it.
So John, for as many events as heparticipated in, you know, was to,
(16:15):
to be able to have a motor likethat that you could really get
after and get on and not worry aboutand you know, be able to protect.
The engine that Chris describedand make sure that that stays as
pristine and proper as it needs to be.
But having another, another engine tobe able to use to, to drive the car.
John drove the car, he drove itrespectfully, but he, but he enjoyed,
you know, when we were out there withhim a couple of months ago, you know,
he very explicitly stated, you know,that cars are meant to be driven.
(16:37):
These cars are meant to be enjoyed.
This race car is, wants you to drive it.
So being able to have thatability to drive it and drive it.
I mean aggressively as you wantto, but in, you know, not to
worry as much about the motor.
You'll have that opportunity to swapa motor if need be for the new owner.
Hot rod motor.
That's what he calls it.
That's right.
The hot rod motor.
Well, that's common too with a lotof higher value cars like that, is
(17:01):
they drop in a different engine andkeep that one safe, which is great.
'cause that means they're getting outthere using their car and participating.
Right.
This day and age, there's somany historic events that you can
participate in you across the globe.
This car will get you into everysingle one, no questions asked.
I mean, that's like your golden ticketto participate in all these events.
So whoever the new owner may be,the palace is open, so to speak.
(17:23):
In regards to just attending any eventyou'd want, and not to mention, I
dunno if you can confirm it, but don'tthe GTO owners do their own kind of
little private events every few years?
They did.
So a few years ago they had a coupledifferent reunions and if you look it up.
You'll see that they had the 50thanniversary GTO tour in 2012 and they
actually had another one they put togetherwith Kena who runs Caino events and
(17:47):
they gotta get together and they tryto get as many of the guys together.
But it's a real special crew.
Obviously the gentleman that have thecars and you know, some of the cars have
swapped in and swapped out, you know, theRick Workmans and different guys like that
that had the cars and they've sold them.
But for the most part into whatyou mentioned earlier, you got Nick
Mason, you got Anthony Bamford,you got Brandon Wangs, you.
(18:07):
At all these different guys thathave had the cars for long term
ownership and they do get togetherfor a reunion every so many years.
It's not every single year.
It seems like it's every few years.
I think every five, to be honest.
What's the amount ofdocumentation is car comes with?
'cause I think that's one thingthat's key, especially in these higher
value cars, is documentation history.
I mean what like documentation wise,what's gonna be coming with the car?
(18:30):
Sam can probably touch on that becauseI didn't see the documentation,
but I know that there is.
Plenty of stuff with John for sure.
I have not physically reviewedall the documentation, but I did
see a couple of big books sittingon the desk with a lot in there.
I mean, I was amazed at how much, howmany historic photos of, of all the
different races that this car participatedin at the beginning, you know, 62 to.
(18:51):
69 ish or 68 ish, something like thatwith all the different photos, photo
documentation we have on this carand, and as it went through all the
different drivers and the differentraces that it was participating
in, as was pretty impressive.
Obviously the Red Book and theownership history is documented
all the way back to the beginning.
It's got good stuff, be impressive.
And I'm sure it would take someonea few weeks to go through all that.
(19:11):
And just as us being all car nerds,we'd sit there and eat it all up.
Just every single line.
'cause just seeing that history,knowing what that thing did, where it
raced, who's raced it, I mean, 'causeyou got, you know, Graham Hill, Roy
Salvador, I mean, it's just unbelievable.
The people that have gottenbehind the wheel of that car,
put it through its paces backin the day is just unbelievable.
Yep.
I wanna talk a little bitmore about Mecu Kissie itself.
(19:31):
'cause this is becoming thepreeminent auction of the year.
Not just volume, but the qualityof cars you guys are getting.
Sam, how's this evolving where you guysare starting to get a lot more of these
highly collectible elite cars and how'sthis changing Mecca's DNA in regards to,
its like core brand and I've been withthe company, I think this is my 18th year.
18th or 19th year.
And so, you know, I, I think I was 2004or five was my first Kissimmee auction.
(19:56):
The auction, I think, started in 2000,was the very first one, which started
buying the laundromat in Kissimmee, in,in Old Town, and evolved over to the,
uh, I think with like 50 cars in it.
And then by that time it, itmoved to OCL Air to Carriage Park.
When I was first there, the auctionand the cars were all inside in one
tent, the corner of the property.
But every single year.
Since then, it has grown almost doubleevery single year, year after year.
(20:20):
Started out with a couple,you know, when I was there, it
was probably two or 300 cars.
Started out as an allCorvette only auction.
Think in conjunction with anNCRS event that was down there.
Dana decided to open up to alltypes of cars and it really just
took fire and never looked back.
And it has, it's grown and grownexponentially year after year
to somewhere around 2010 ish.
It, the hold is the world's largestelectric car auction with the volume
(20:43):
of cars that were at one event.
And continue to grow past that.
We're pushing 5,000 cars now, sofrom 50 cars behind the laundromat
to 5,000 cars in 13 days long,it has just become a spectacle.
It's the greatest car show on earth, inmy opinion, far as where you can see,
you know, every type of vehicle that youcan imagine is there that week, and it
really sets the tone for the collectivecar market for the rest of the year.
(21:05):
How do you guys go about, youknow, having that volume of cars,
obviously over multiple days.
How do you start organizing, okay,we're gonna have these go on this day,
these on this day, and I love it, themoniker, leading up to Super Saturday
when you have all the big hitters.
I mean, how do you guys kind of go about.
Figuring out what goes where.
Anytime you put four to 5,000 carsin, in one place, you know, how
(21:26):
do you disseminate what needs togo where and how do you do that?
And we do that by value.
You know, the, the weekends are ourmost attended events, both the first
weekend and the second weekend arethe, are the most heavily attended.
So, you know, the, the veryfirst day, day one will be,
you know, relatively expensive.
What we like to refer to asentry level collectibles.
Things of people that are just lookingto get into the market, dip their toe
in the water and, and get into it.
(21:47):
We've got a lot more affordablecars in those early days.
Sort of apex and lead ourselvesinto that first weekend.
And we get some really great cars.
That first weekend type of quality youwould see in some of our bigger days at
at some of our other events throughoutthe country throughout the year.
And then we do a bit of a reset.
There's sort of two big crowds.
You have the first weekend crowd,which is a little bit more regional.
Then the, the national and internationalcrowd starts to come in day after day
(22:09):
as we lead into the second weekend.
So Tuesday is slightly smaller, thenit gets bigger on Wednesday, which
gets bigger on Thursday, biggerto Friday, and then onto Saturday.
And everything culminates atthe, the peak on Saturday.
So Friday and Saturday, the secondweekend are our two biggest days.
It's heavy metal from startto finish on both those days.
So the cool thing is, anyone that'sin the hobby or whatever level you can
(22:29):
get involved in Kissimmee and be a partof it and connect with it, you know,
whether as a buyer or a seller, buteven as you know, from a spectator's
perspective, to see cars that arepretty attainable up to the aspirational
vehicles that to watch these guys.
Trading high dollar, extremely valuablecars into that second weekend is,
is what makes Kissimmee so special.
Great.
'cause a lot of people, either it is theirfirst collectible, the only collectible
they're gonna buy, but to your point isthere's something there for everyone.
(22:51):
Not just price point,but style, genre heavy.
I mean, there's somethingthere for everybody.
You know, in cars like this, GTO thatwe're talking about here, I mean obviously
is the headliner for Saturday, the secondweekend as Kissimmee continue to grow
and the international attention that itreceives and the amount of people that
come to it, all 50 states in the, in theUnited States and, and from, I think it
was 30 different countries around theworld that participate in this event.
(23:13):
The fact that we have that big of anaudience and that amount of eyeballs
focused on one location at one pointin time has really opened the eyes
to a lot of folks to realize thatif I wanna sell my car and I wanna
bring the most attention to it in oneplace and and maximize the exposure,
Kissimmee is the place to do that.
And I think that the more and morepeople realize, you know, you can take
a car like this and go to Montereyand compete with six different auction
(23:34):
events going on the same weekend,on the same day at the same time.
Or you can put this car on apedestal in front of an international
audience that's arguably bigger.
And find success being a multi-dayevent over, you know, a week
and a half, two weeks roughly.
What other events also go on during that?
It's not 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM it'scars going across the block.
What else do you guys have going on there?
Well, it is 8:00 AM to 8:00PM with cars going across.
(23:56):
Oh, it across the block.
Oh, okay.
That does happen.
Oh yeah.
No, we're bell to be, we'reselling 350 on or on some of the
days, almost 400 cars in a day.
To sell that many, that amountof cars, you have to work that
hard and, and work that long.
But the event itself, we've gotentertainment going outside with music
and things going outside an adventurezone for kids, for families to come out
and enjoy themselves and they can getinvolved and do, you know, automotive
(24:16):
orientated events with the kids?
We'll have speakers and, and seminarsgoing on at our midway stage out front.
We do car parades, you know, the carsdon't just sit on display forever
until they're time to go to the block.
We do some hand selects and we docar parades across our midways like
we like to call it, so folks cansit and watch the cars, run, drive,
listen to 'em, huge food truck area.
I think over a dozen food trucksthat are out there with all different
(24:37):
types of food for people to getinvolved with and, and hang out.
It's just a, from a car enthusiastperspective, it's like Disneyland
or Disney World, I shouldsay, as we're in Orlando, but.
There's just a tongue going on.
It's a, it's very stimulatingthis day and age too.
How has, you know, working socialmedia, YouTube, and obviously you
guys are broadcasting now too, howhas that changed your guys' approach
and has that really helped you guysacquire and grow in regards, not just
(25:00):
volume, but cars, you guys are getting.
We're very much also inthe entertainment business.
Our auctions are broadcast liveon ESPN, ESPN Plus we launched,
uh, mecom TV on the Roku channel.
So we have 24 7 Mecu auctions rolling.
We're produc content for that.
We've, we're nearing a show on,on the GTO, on Mecu tv, you know,
between YouTube and all the contentwe produce for that social media.
(25:21):
Insta, we have a, a whole team dedicatedto social media from Instagram.
Facebook and TikTok and all the like, andyou know, we're very much an entertainment
company just as much as we are an auctioncompany now, with the kind of cars
across our block and the, and the thecool stories that we're able to tell.
We've got content coming out of ourears and we love telling the story
about video and it's, it's fun.
It's why, it's why I got into this.
(25:41):
Yeah.
I mean that's one great thing aboutthis industry or just cars itself, is
knowing the story behind a lot of it.
'cause a lot, every car's got a story.
It's fantastic to learn a lotof these things and delving into
those creates, I don't wanna saya mystique, but it really kind of
can grow and make that car special.
No, absolutely.
I mean, the amount of cars thatwe see year after year, I think
Chris wouldn't feel the same.
I mean, we're in the cars are our work.
(26:01):
That's our life.
That's what we do dayin, day out every day.
But when you find a car with a greatstory behind it and the people that
you meet because of that story or theconnections that you make because of
that, that's what makes this stuff cool.
The cars are great and then people ask usall the time, what's your favorite car?
What car do you want?
It's, to me, it changes all the time.
I mean, it's, it's about the peopleand the stories that you hear and
learn and the connections that youmake along the way is what makes
(26:22):
this this hobby super cool and funand, and great to be a part of.
Looking at it, we have 70 plus Ferrari.
As of now, basically going acrossthe block down and kissing me.
You know, obviously Callate inthe GTO, but you have a very, very
nice selection of Ferraris thatare gonna be crossing that block.
Absolutely.
Probably one of the best collections ofFerraris that we've ever offered for sale.
Yeah.
The Bachman collection, whichwe'll do in a couple weeks.
(26:44):
We're gonna do an episodeon that one as well.
'cause there's some very specialvehicles in that one as well.
Mm-hmm.
Chris, I'm gonna have you kind oftouch on this, MECU, obviously what
they're getting now and get involvedin the level of cars they're doing.
I mean, it's just top notch.
What was the choice?
I mean, going to Mecu, what was thethought about, hey, let's, this car
is gonna be best served at Mecu?
So what happened was, originally Iwas at Retro Mobile in Paris and you
(27:07):
know, doing your normal visits, you'remeeting all the different people.
I bumped into one ofthe Pebble Beach judges.
His name is Richard Ado.
He is also an author and writessome great books on French cars.
We had a really good dinner together.
You know, we met the year beforeand had dinner as well, and then the
following day he went back to Washington.
He is a very good friend of John Shirley.
A couple weeks later we had theevent that was at Amelia Island, and
(27:28):
I see Richard as I'm checking outtathe hotel and he says to me, uh.
Hey, where you heading back to?
I said, I'm heading back toOrlando, catching a flight.
He said, you mind if I tag along?
So he jumps in the car.
We're probably an hour into the ride,and he looks at me and he says, Hey,
you got anybody for John's two 50 GTO?
I almost went off the road to behonest with you, and I looked at
him and I said, you're serious?
He said, yeah.
(27:49):
And the first person that popped in mymind was Dana, because Dana's a collector.
I picked up the phone that evening.
I called Dana and we had a chat.
Dana said, listen, you know, I was alreadyinvolved with helping Dana with the 2
75 lm. We were restoring that car, and Iwas looking after that project in Italy.
I said to him, which is, is this somethingyou'd want to add to the collection?
And he said, you know what?
(28:10):
Let's have a conversation with John.
We had a conversation with John.
We went out there and Dana, John,myself, we all sat together.
The decision was made 'cause itwasn't something that Dana was
gonna put into his collection.
It was best suited tobring it to public auction.
Obviously John's still the owner ofthe car, and we connected Dana and
John together and it was a match madein heaven, as they say, because as Sam
(28:31):
pointed out, you know, and you pointed outthere's over 70 cars going to Kissimmee.
We're gonna talk about the Bachmancollection in the future, which
is a real special collection.
To my knowledge, I don't know ofany Ferrari collection or this
amount of Ferraris that's ever beenpresented at one auction at one
time, ever, at any point in time.
So it's super exciting.
(28:52):
You know Dana, from a personal level,he's got a an amazing Ferrari collection.
He's a real true connoisseur to the brand.
He shows his cars.
He's obviously involved with Pebble Beach.
He does the Caino events, hedoes the Amelia Island events.
Dana's obviously the right guythat's personally involved.
It's not just a business.
Dana has a true love for the cars.
I really honestly felt, you know, whenthe conversation came up and it just
(29:14):
evolved so quickly, it really, really,really went well and it was great to
be part of it, to see the meeting withJohn and obviously with Dana together.
It was, it was a great, great timeand it's, and it's worked out well.
That's what awesome thing about Danais, you know, he is a true collector.
I mean, he has a passion for these carsas well, and seeing his unbelievable
collections, you know, fantastic as well.
When Dana kind of dropped thatbomb on everyone else at Mecu,
(29:37):
what was the thoughts andenthusiasm around the offices?
Our marketing team gotextremely excited really quick.
I mean, you know, obviously, you know,the nice thing is, you know when,
when you're as promoters of auctionsand you know, with headliners and
headliners like this, especially to get.
As early as we're able to do and be ableto kick off our Kissimmee campaigns with
a car of this magnitude was excitingfor all of us and to, you know, really,
(30:00):
you know, set the tone, set the toneearly and March towards January.
I mean, we, we announced the,the GTO was coming to Kissimmee.
We announced it in Monterey inAugust, that our auction air being
able to, to launch the campaigns forKissimmee in the middle of August
with a headliner like this, GTO.
It was the best.
We were excited.
Not just that car, but the amountof other Ferrari they're gonna be
(30:20):
crossing the block and kissing me.
This is really gonna kind of set thetone for the market because you know
you have your top end, I'm not gonnasay bottom end with like some three
oh eights and three 20 eights, but.
This is really gonna kind ofset the tone in regards to where
the market's going into 2026.
In my mind, it's kind of a bigresponsibility in regards to all
the eyes that are gonna be onYou guys we're up to that task.
(30:42):
That challenge in Kissimmee for yearsnow has been that market tone setter
for whatever type of vehicle forall the different markets, right?
So.
Whether it be muscle cars orCorvettes or Ferraris or, or whatever.
I mean, you know, the fact that wekick it off in January, we start
the year off with such a bang withthis auction, it sets the tone for
the market for the rest of the year.
No doubt about it.
So we do it on an annual basis andwe're excited to do it for Ferrari.
(31:03):
As you delve into these more,do you guys see yourself.
Stick into your true path in regardsto how you guys do your auctions?
Or do you see yourself doing somethinga little different with like, say,
a separate high end type situation?
We do it all together, but we also, wedo what's necessary for the different
types of vehicles and set the stage.
I mean the displays that we puttogether and produce in Kissimmee or
(31:25):
our second to none, and we will do thesecars justice for what they deserve.
And you know, having the opportunityto have these on display is a hell
of an attraction for the peoplethat come just to watch the show.
But to segregate.
Where we position these cars in theauction, how we put 'em on display, how
we represent them, how we present them.
It's taken Kissimmee to another level.
Once again, as I described, as wecontinue this growth trajectory for
(31:46):
Kissimmee and adding this layer on topof what's already extremely successful
and, and has become the world's largestcollector car auction, they have this
on top of that is, is incredible.
We're proud to do it.
We're proud, we're excited to have it.
We're pleased that the, you know, thesellers have given us the opportunity
to present these cars for sale atauction in Kissimmee, and we're
excited to see what the results.
Yeah, it's gonna be a packedroom, that's for sure.
(32:07):
And I know I plan on trying to be therefor it as well, especially seeing all this
go across because it's gonna be fantastic.
Yep.
Chris, when was the last time your GTOcrossed the block open auction like this?
A couple years ago, there was onethat passed over the block and
there was a series two that passed.
There's never been a white one.
No.
That's what sets this car apart and, andlook, you know, we kind of touched on it
earlier about, you know, Sam mentionedit, I talked about it a little bit, John,
(32:30):
how involved he was and some of themcars, you know, they've been restored.
There was one that was totally restoredand it, you know, it didn't look like
that obviously when it left the factoryin 62 or 63 when that particular car left.
This car has a realperiod correct feel to it.
It's just an amazing car.
And then, you know, on top ofit you have the hot rod motor.
(32:50):
It's white.
The provenance of who owned the car,who drove the car, Mike Parks, Graham
Hill, former, the one world champion.
You got really, really, really specialpeople that race this car in period.
It's, it's a real special car.
It really is.
Obviously to bid on this car price wise,where, and I'm not gonna get into say,
Hey, what do you think it's gonna go for?
Because we're not even gonna touch that.
(33:12):
What does someone gotta do for a carat that level, registering, whatnot.
I mean, is there anything different theyhave to do that wouldn't be say, under
different from standard, just registeringto bid every situation's different.
Obviously, you know, there relationshipsare big components of this and you know.
You know, if we have someone that'scomes out of nowhere from, you
know, somewhere in Europe or that,that we're not aware of, obviously
(33:32):
there'll be conversations that'llhave, and we'll set their financial
verification up, get 'em registeredto bid with an understanding that they
have the means to purchase that car.
And, you know, ens are, are alwayshelpful and, and things like that,
but you know, it, it gets a car likethis, it gets to be a case by case.
I mean, you know, rarely do you havesomeone that just goes and registers a
bid online and just, you know, pops outtathe woodwork, you know, but it's, it's
(33:54):
not to say it's never happened, but it.
Yeah, I mean, it's, it's an easy process.
Getting registered is easy, you know,getting a hold of us and having a
conversation with our bid servicesteam and, and getting connected.
Chris obviously is, is helpingwith his context and throughout the
country and, and around the world.
It's not a overly complex process,but you know, you can't just log
in and push a button without anytype of financial verification.
Bid, bid, bid, yeah.
(34:15):
Your media pass request hasprobably gone through the roof.
Yeah, there's a lot of,a lot of media attention.
There's a lot of, you know, a lot comingin on that actually, you know, vetting
some of these, you know, some of thesemedia folks is probably more difficult
than vetting some of these high networkindividuals with, on your Roku channel.
You guys are gonna doing a, aspecial on this car specifically,
(34:36):
and I would assume that on theRoku gets played multiple times.
Yeah, it'll rear multiple times.
I think it's gonna rear air fourtimes a day after we premiere
it Thursday, November 6th.
It will premier at 8:00 PMEastern on Mecu CV on Roku.
And then after premieres it'll,it'll cycle through and re-air, I
think four times a day between nowand Kissimmee auction in January.
You know, be sure to, uh, check outall of Mecu M'S social media pages
(34:57):
and sites 'cause they are doing awonderful job showcasing that, what
that car is and just how special it is.
'cause it's unbelievable.
And I'm really excited about this auction.
It's gonna be the biggest.
Ferrari auction at oneplace on one time ever.
You're never gonna see the quality ofcars at one place, at one venue that
you're gonna see at this auction.
This is gonna be historic and like Samsaid, greatest spectacle on sports.
(35:21):
They always used to say was the Indy 500.
Well, this would be the greatestspectacle in in auctions for sure.
This is.
You gotta be part of it.
This is a moment in history, you know,it's one of those things, it only comes
and happens every so often and I thinkthis is gonna be a really special moment
and this car's gonna really be strongand I'm really excited to see, 'cause
you know, not just this one, but all theother fris gonna be crossing the block.
(35:42):
This is a moment in Ferrari history inregards to what's gonna be happening.
'cause there's a lot of special vehicles.
Again, I appreciate you guys coming on.
Uh, I look forward in a couple weeks.
We're gonna come back.
We're gonna visit the Bachmancollection, which is also gonna be
crossing the block down in Kissie.
And that one's gonna bespectacular in its, its own right.
The quality and what the cars arein that collection is unbelievable.
And Chris will be back.
(36:02):
Sam, we'll be back.
And to everyone listening, appreciateyou tuning in and stay tuned
till uh, next time you got it.
Thank you.
Alright, thanks guys.
Bye-bye.
Nobody sells more than Mecu.
Nobody.
Mecom Auctions is the world's leaderof collector car vintage and antique
motorcycle and road art sales hostingauctions throughout the United States.
(36:22):
The company had specialized in thesale of collector cars for more than
35 years now, offering more than22,000 lots per year and averaging
more than one auction per month.
Mecom Auctions is headquartered inWalworth, Wisconsin, and since 2011
has been ranked number one in the worldwith the number of collective cars
(36:44):
offered at auction, and is host to theworld's largest collector car auction
held annually in Kissimmee, Florida, aswell as the largest motorcycle auction
held annually in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Mes, road Art and Mecu on Time.
Divisions offer a wide variety ofcollectibles for live and online auctions.
You can learn more and follow Mecu andtheir upcoming events@www.mecu.com,
(37:12):
or you can follow them on socialat Mecca Auction on Facebook
at Mecom Auctions on Instagram.
At Ika on Twitter and atMicham auction on YouTube.
For everything from Ferrari andPorsche, Lamborghini and Konig seg,
visit exotic car marketplace.com.
If you're into anything with wheelsand a motor, log onto the Motoring
(37:34):
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This is the place to findyour favorite new show.
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Let your imagination run wild.
And finally, grand touring motorsportscovering all aspects of auto
(37:58):
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(38:21):
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(38:41):
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As part of Ferrari Fridays, WilliamRoss from the Exotic Car Marketplace
will be discussing all things Ferrariand interviewing people that live
and breathe The Ferrari brand.
Topics range from road cars toracing drivers to owners, as well
as auctions, private sales andtrends in the collector market.
Never, never.
(00:28):
Welcome to the FerrariMarketplace Podcast.
Today we're gonna take a deep diveinto the legend itself, the Ferrari
two 50 GTO with only 36 ever built.
The GTO sits the top of thecollector car market with its
racing pedigree, unmatched beauty.
Its history with some of themotorsports most prolific drivers.
It is the ultimate expressionof Ferrari's 1960s.
(00:49):
Racing dominance.
But today we're not justgonna talk about any GTO.
We're specifically gonna talkabout chassis 3 7 2 9 gt.
This is the only two 50 GTO that left thefactory in Bianco's, Speciale, or for us
that don't speak Italian, that's white.
We believe it might have been at therequest of John Coons being that he
was British and didn't wanna have ared car, but one of my guests might
(01:09):
be able to delve into that a smidge.
And for now though, but the firsttime in, geez, multiple decades,
this GTO is coming to auction.
Specifically, it's gonna becoming to Mecca's Kissame Auction
in January, the world's largestcollector car auction event today.
Joining me also on this is gonnabe Sam Murtaugh, COO of Meum
Auctions, and Chris Neely fromthe Prancing Horse of Nashville.
(01:32):
So gentlemen, welcome to the show.
Thank you.
Thank you.
So let's just jump rightinto the car itself.
This specific GTO, there's somereally great specifics about this
car that make, in my opinion, one ofthe more collectible ones of the 36.
You know, I mean obviously all of 'emare collectible, but you know, there's
some really good specifics about thiscar itself that I think makes it kind
of stand out from the other ones.
(01:54):
It's just one of eightright hand drive cars.
My opinion outta 36 1 8, that kind ofmakes it a little bit more special.
Chris, what are your thoughts on that?
Being one of only eightright hand drive cars.
Obviously it was sold to a UK owner,so the cars are right hand drive.
It's the car that he preferred to have.
I mean, they're just used to it.
For us in the states, it's a little oddfor us, but I mean, right hand drive cars
(02:14):
are super desirable in certain markets.
One right hand drive cars, which obviouslyshrinks the rarity from 36 down to
eight, but the fact that this is paintedwhite, it is the only one painted white
from the factory, basically being theonly one, regardless of the right hand
drive, the only one painted white ofthe whole group is the most powerful
piece of this car from my perspective.
I mean, whether it's right or lefthand drive, whatever you like, but
(02:36):
the fact that it's the only one inwhite, that is the spectacular fact
to me, from a rarity standpoint.
I agree.
I think it looks spectacular andwhite myself, that's for sure.
Yep.
Makes it stand out.
And especially the fact that, you know,you had a lot of 'em that have been
repainted different colors and that, butthis day and age, it's always good to
have it go back to its factory color,being that one of one, you'll know which
special car you have out of all of them.
No, no question.
(02:57):
I mean, if you wanna stand out in a leadcrowd of which, of being an owner of
A GTO, what you at the, you know, thehighest of the pedestal, but to have the
only one in white and to stand out inwhite, I mean it, to see, it, it just, the
white color in that car and the lines inthat car, it's, it's, it's spectacular.
Most definitely, definitely.
Now.
Do we know specifically whythat left a factory in white?
(03:17):
Was it at the request of cos?
I believe so, yes.
At least wasn't green, butwhite looks very nice on it.
Another great thing, or I guess,special, unique thing about this
car itself is everyone that isfamiliar with the nose, GTOs.
They all think they have blue interior.
That car actually came with the, fromthe factory in with the black interior?
(03:37):
No, it came with a blue interior, butwhen it immediately was delivered in
period with the number 10 on it, it wasthe car that was run by Graham Hill.
From the best of my knowledge, I believethat the car had the black seats, and that
was only weeks after the car was deliver.
So I think that's what they changed up onit when the car got delivered to the uk.
Wondering why they would do that soquickly, switching from the blue.
(03:58):
Well, did all the, uh, GTOscome blue and black or was there
another color else came in?
No, there was a few different colors.
There was some thatwere delivered with red.
There was some that weredelivered with green.
There was even black interiors.
It was just something at the time theyused almost like a Nomex type material.
So the driver wanted to slide around inhis, in his overalls, in his racing suit.
It was almost like a vinyl on the sidesthat was used on the side bolsters.
(04:21):
But the seats are very, very, verysmall seat that's in that car.
It's super easy to retrim and put,you know, whatever color you want
it, but I'm assuming that Coombs,that was his look, his livery that
he had was white with black 'causeit was obviously requested that way.
But anyone out there listeningknows why they did it so quickly.
Shoot me a message 'causewe'd like to know if we get an
(04:41):
answer that that'd be fantastic.
But, uh, that's good to know.
'cause I always, I think of bluewhen I think of GTO on the interior,
something that would stand out.
But black, white, interior, fantastic.
Coombs actually being a Jaguar guysent the car over to Jaguar for them
to guess reverse engineer it, to tryand get their Jaguar up to speed.
'cause the GTO was so fast.
(05:01):
What do we know about that little story?
'cause it's never been confirmed,but it's kind of pretty well known.
Coombs, you know, was.
As Chris mentioned, he was British andyou know, obviously was, was heavy into
the associate with Jaguar and, and it saidthat Jaguar engineers wanted to get their
hands on that to figure out what's goingon, why, what's making this car so great.
And to be able to have an opportunitywith the relationship with Coombs and,
(05:22):
and get their hands on, on a GTO to, youknow, looking into that car and, and.
Figuring out what they could use from thatto prototype their lightweight e types.
Coombs did a few special things tokind of, I wanna say differentiate.
I don't know if make it better.
What did Coombs do to the car itself?
Do I guess, in his mind, improve it?
Coombs, I believe, put the increasedcooling in it, so the third vent.
Most of the cars havethe two vents on 'em.
(05:43):
This car has three vents on the righthand side and he made some other small
modifications to the car 'cause he wasobviously competing with the car and
they were showing the car and runningit everywhere they could in the uk.
The louvers on the hood I believewas something cos added and I think
air ducts in the front, I think hereplaced those fog lights and made
those functional air, I believe.
I'm not mistaken, he didmake some small ones.
There's a photo of the car withGraham Hill running the car and
(06:06):
it's got the three vents on it.
So you know, it was definitely a threevent car originally because there's
other photos when you look at it.
The green one that I mentionedto you, that it was actually a
little bit earlier car, and there'scars that were later than it that
actually had the two vents as well.
So there had to be a point withti when they went ahead and they
built the body on these cars.
It had to be a request, but it wasn'tsomething that Coombs, you gotta be clear
(06:30):
about that, that it was added afterwards.
There's a few of them that havethe three vents on the side.
There are a few cars that havethe three vents because you can
clearly see it in the photo.
They had those three ventholes in the front, but.
There's other ones that were inthe bonnet and you know, cars had,
you know, different things in them.
This car, uh, it hasn't been modified.
(06:51):
This is the way that this car was ordered.
The vents on the hood onthe front or in the nose.
Can you open and close those?
Yes.
In motion?
No, not in motion.
No.
You just go ahead and they have.
Quick fasteners on 'emand you just put 'em in.
So they obviously did it for coolingbecause if they don't want the car to
run too hot or obviously too cool atLamont specifically, or, and a lot of
the other tracks back then, they had alot of very long straits and obviously
(07:13):
aerodynamics come into play, wasn't it?
Early cars, they came to the conclusionor realized that it was having a
lot of nose lift at higher speeds.
Yeah.
That's when the early days of aerodynamicswere really starting to kick in and
they started to figure out, we gottago ahead and keep this car cool or hot.
But you know, the more openings thatyou have on a car, the more it slows
it down because that's just thatmuch more error that's not slipping
(07:35):
over the car, it's going into it.
It's kind of the balancingact at that point.
If you look at the grill on atwo 50 GTO, it's quite small.
Yeah.
And as a sidebar, when you look atthe car, like the 2 75 car, the hen
car, the the sister car to Dana's car.
During the race, they had to getwire snipers in 65 and cut a giant
hole in the front of the car justto get more air into the car.
(07:55):
And that's really thesuccessor to the two 50 GTL.
Always keep in mind that, you know,yes, you could drive 'em on the
street, but these were race cars.
That's what they werebuilt for back in the day.
It was to compete.
People would sit there andlook how minimalist the
interior is and what it's got.
It doesn't have any creature comforts.
This thing had one purpose andthat was to go fast and win races,
extra cooling, everything would becritical back then too, especially.
(08:18):
Front engine V 12 is gonna need tobreathe as much as it possibly can.
Sure.
This car's really, it's never been,I wanna say wrecked, but I mean it
might've had a ding or two or hereor there, but it's never had anything
of serious consequence where quarterpanels, all this stuff had to get
replaced or anything like that.
Pretty solid as an original car.
Right?
Well, Mike Parks had an accident withit in 63, which is well documented.
(08:41):
You know, it had its battle scars and,and the way that it worked, if you
were racing for Ferrari, if you weren'tpushing the car right to the very edge.
You were no longer gonna be aracing driver for Enzo Ferrari.
It was first or nothing with them.
You know, it didn't, it wasn't,you know, second or third place,
they weren't satisfied with that.
It was win at all costs and thedrivers put the cars to their limits
(09:02):
and they pushed 'em right to the edge.
And sometimes they went alittle bit over the edge.
But to your point where you mentionedearlier, was it completely in an
accident, some of the other GTOshave had some catastrophic crashes.
No, this car didn't it,it was raced in period.
It had its battle scars.
As they say, structurally,the cars is sound.
And it's, you know, the, theway that the car always was.
(09:23):
Yeah.
That's fantastic.
Some of these have been, I would say,damage bound recognition, but you know,
they have some significant damage andhaving something that's that original
close original is fantastic as well.
For sure.
Let's get into specifically 37 2 9 GT Ferrari, two 50 GTO
in the, uh, build sequence.
When was this one built?
Number 12.
Okay.
So they had some, I guess you wouldsay testing or I'd say racing done
(09:46):
prior to that one being built.
So they probably modified that afterknowing that that needed more cooling.
Yeah, and it, and it's funny, on themost part, the cars were all the same.
One of them has a different differential.
Two of them actually have a differentdifferential in them, and then
there's some that, you know, havea stripe on 'em, which is noted
obviously originally how it left.
But this was the third one for the uk.
(10:07):
So I believe it's the third right handdrive car, at least what I'm seeing here.
It's number 12.
Most of 'em are Rosana,but some of them are.
Rosa Corsa is what it shows here,which I don't know if that's a
screw up in the computer or not.
I didn't know that that wasactually a color at any point
until way, way later racing red.
Oh no, it actually, no, no, no.
It is though.
I see another car with it as well.
(10:28):
I see three cars with it.
Yeah.
It's quite unique.
This car.
But it's definitely, when Ilook at this car, 3 7 2 9, it's
the 12th one that was produced.
You know, one thing that I think isvery special too, and what's great
about this car is the long-termownership history that this car's had.
Chris, can you touch on that a little bit?
Regarding to basically just only areally a couple owners, Jack Sears had
(10:51):
the car from 1970 all the way to 19.
99. I mean, he had a, along ownership with the car.
That's when John Shirleypurchased the vehicle.
30 years is impressive forkeeping a car of that nature's.
What did he buy that car for?
I, it wasn't all that much backin, what was it, 71, he bought it.
Oh yeah.
So in 1971, that car probablyat the absolute most, would've
(11:13):
been probably 10 to $15,000.
I know that the Nick Mason car was sold.
For about 35 to $40,000 from RonaldStern to Nick Mason in 1978 or 79,
I'd say in the early seventies, it wasprobably somewhere around 15, maybe
20,000, somewhere in the neighborhood.
So it's, it's quite the investmentwhen you really look at it.
(11:35):
Yeah, a little bit.
Yeah, that's a nice return.
You know, and I, A little side story,Nick Mason utilized his car's collateral
to fund, it was the mid eightiesPink Floyd reunion tour, whatever.
They put that up as collateral,I dunno, it was like a million
bucks or something like that tobe able to pay for their tour.
That came back tenfoldjust on the tour alone.
So that's always kind of aninching little story at that.
(11:55):
Great story after.
Sure.
Yeah.
John Shirley got the car in 1999.
John, I believe at that pointin time was only shortly
thereafter, he was still working.
You know, he was the former CEO ofMicrosoft and he got the vehicle
and he used it quite a bit.
I mean, he took it toall the Caino classics.
He took it to the Monterey Historic Races.
(12:17):
I mean, he really, really had a lotof fun with the car and showed it
off, and everyone, as Sam mentioned,knew it as the white Ferrari, GTO.
It's a real special car and obviously,uh, John was heavily involved with,
you know, a lot of other things that hedid at Pebble Beach as far as showing
other vehicles and doing Concor events.
So he is a well-known name,so he did it from all sides.
(12:38):
He was not only showing cars, hewas doing track days with cars and
heavily involved with doing everything,even involved obviously with Froy
class CK, getting the car certified.
With Ferrari Classic K. He's been anoutstanding caretaker and obviously we can
see for multiple decades, which is great.
Then the previous owner of that, JackSears, you know, he had it for 20 plus
(12:59):
years himself, which was great to see,and they thoroughly enjoyed the car.
If you look at the history on that racinghistorics and everything like that,
that car was out there in the publicbeauty in motion, I guess you could say.
I mean, it's just a fantastic car.
Chris, you touched on, you know, thecar's obviously got its red book.
It's got the classic case certification.
That's Ferrari going through and saying,yes, this is how this car came from the
factory for this auction itself coming up.
(13:21):
What would need to be done orwhat gets done to the car itself,
especially a car at that level,getting it ready for the auction.
What gets done prior to the auction,John, he has his own gentleman
that works for him, Fred, and theyreally take care of all the cars.
The cars are extremely well maintained.
The whole collection that he has.
And this car in particular, obviouslywas no different than any other one.
(13:41):
That being said, when Johnfirst had the car, it was red.
When he first purchasedthe car, it was red.
And then in 2008, I believe the cargot the classic case certification
and that's when they went ahead andthey, Ferrari made a new engine block.
That was installed in the car and it hasthe designation on there, the internal
number, 2300 slash 62 EE for Echo,which designates that it is a GTO motor,
(14:05):
which is done right from the factory.
So at some point early in itslife, the engine was replaced.
It was a two 50 short wheelbase competency on engine
that was put in for some time.
Then there was a two 50 GTEengine that was put in, but
right now it has the properspecification motor that's in there.
From the factory.
So the car was mechanicallymaintained, but it was never restored.
(14:27):
The car is still not a completeframe wall for restoration.
John had the car, it was Red John usedthe gentleman, I believe Butch Denison
did the car up in Washington Stateand he brought the car back to white.
But initially, John Shirley wasn'tconvinced to make the car white.
It was the guys at Ferrari Classic K.
It was actually Marco Origi whoreally pressed the issue with him.
(14:48):
And then sure enough, John paintedthe car in 2016, I believe, and
then the first time it came outwas at Windsor Castle in the uk.
And that's when you know the bigpuff was, Hey, there's a white GTO.
Because for many, many, many,many years, the car was red.
I don't think a lot of people knew, andthe internet isn't what it is today.
I mean, every year it seems like theinternet evolves and there was no
(15:10):
ai, you know, unless you went aheadand scrubbed it and found photos.
Many of the photos that you found werefrom very, very early in the days.
But for a good period of its time, thecar was red and now it's back to the
original way that it left the factory,which is white in the collector car world.
There was that period where itwas like basically restored to
better than new, not so much.
Really follow, Hey, thisis not left the factory.
Then all of a sudden we went into the barnfinds and everything, but then all of a
(15:32):
sudden, hey, let's go back to originality.
It's fantastic.
He did that, went back to the whiteand he got talked into or convinced
that, hey, that's the way to go.
And obviously it turned out I thinkit was an excellent choice 'cause
it just stands out from the restbecause you get it all lined up.
Red, red, black, just onewhite one, stick it in there.
So I mean it's, it's great to see for surewhen you look at the list and you look at
the original colors from the factory, youknow there's some obviously silvers green.
(15:55):
But to your point, primarily ena, Imean most of 'em are red mentioned, the
engine block it and recast and lookingat description, what you guys have that
that's coming with another motor, correct?
Yeah.
The engine that Chris describedis in the car and, and there's a
spare motor that will come with it.
So John, for as many events as heparticipated in, you know, was to,
(16:15):
to be able to have a motor likethat that you could really get
after and get on and not worry aboutand you know, be able to protect.
The engine that Chris describedand make sure that that stays as
pristine and proper as it needs to be.
But having another, another engine tobe able to use to, to drive the car.
John drove the car, he drove itrespectfully, but he, but he enjoyed,
you know, when we were out there withhim a couple of months ago, you know,
he very explicitly stated, you know,that cars are meant to be driven.
(16:37):
These cars are meant to be enjoyed.
This race car is, wants you to drive it.
So being able to have thatability to drive it and drive it.
I mean aggressively as you wantto, but in, you know, not to
worry as much about the motor.
You'll have that opportunity to swapa motor if need be for the new owner.
Hot rod motor.
That's what he calls it.
That's right.
The hot rod motor.
Well, that's common too with a lotof higher value cars like that, is
(17:01):
they drop in a different engine andkeep that one safe, which is great.
'cause that means they're getting outthere using their car and participating.
Right.
This day and age, there's somany historic events that you can
participate in you across the globe.
This car will get you into everysingle one, no questions asked.
I mean, that's like your golden ticketto participate in all these events.
So whoever the new owner may be,the palace is open, so to speak.
(17:23):
In regards to just attending any eventyou'd want, and not to mention, I
dunno if you can confirm it, but don'tthe GTO owners do their own kind of
little private events every few years?
They did.
So a few years ago they had a coupledifferent reunions and if you look it up.
You'll see that they had the 50thanniversary GTO tour in 2012 and they
actually had another one they put togetherwith Kena who runs Caino events and
(17:47):
they gotta get together and they tryto get as many of the guys together.
But it's a real special crew.
Obviously the gentleman that have thecars and you know, some of the cars have
swapped in and swapped out, you know, theRick Workmans and different guys like that
that had the cars and they've sold them.
But for the most part into whatyou mentioned earlier, you got Nick
Mason, you got Anthony Bamford,you got Brandon Wangs, you.
(18:07):
At all these different guys thathave had the cars for long term
ownership and they do get togetherfor a reunion every so many years.
It's not every single year.
It seems like it's every few years.
I think every five, to be honest.
What's the amount ofdocumentation is car comes with?
'cause I think that's one thingthat's key, especially in these higher
value cars, is documentation history.
I mean what like documentation wise,what's gonna be coming with the car?
(18:30):
Sam can probably touch on that becauseI didn't see the documentation,
but I know that there is.
Plenty of stuff with John for sure.
I have not physically reviewedall the documentation, but I did
see a couple of big books sittingon the desk with a lot in there.
I mean, I was amazed at how much, howmany historic photos of, of all the
different races that this car participatedin at the beginning, you know, 62 to.
(18:51):
69 ish or 68 ish, something like thatwith all the different photos, photo
documentation we have on this carand, and as it went through all the
different drivers and the differentraces that it was participating
in, as was pretty impressive.
Obviously the Red Book and theownership history is documented
all the way back to the beginning.
It's got good stuff, be impressive.
And I'm sure it would take someonea few weeks to go through all that.
(19:11):
And just as us being all car nerds,we'd sit there and eat it all up.
Just every single line.
'cause just seeing that history,knowing what that thing did, where it
raced, who's raced it, I mean, 'causeyou got, you know, Graham Hill, Roy
Salvador, I mean, it's just unbelievable.
The people that have gottenbehind the wheel of that car,
put it through its paces backin the day is just unbelievable.
Yep.
I wanna talk a little bitmore about Mecu Kissie itself.
(19:31):
'cause this is becoming thepreeminent auction of the year.
Not just volume, but the qualityof cars you guys are getting.
Sam, how's this evolving where you guysare starting to get a lot more of these
highly collectible elite cars and how'sthis changing Mecca's DNA in regards to,
its like core brand and I've been withthe company, I think this is my 18th year.
18th or 19th year.
And so, you know, I, I think I was 2004or five was my first Kissimmee auction.
(19:56):
The auction, I think, started in 2000,was the very first one, which started
buying the laundromat in Kissimmee, in,in Old Town, and evolved over to the,
uh, I think with like 50 cars in it.
And then by that time it, itmoved to OCL Air to Carriage Park.
When I was first there, the auctionand the cars were all inside in one
tent, the corner of the property.
But every single year.
Since then, it has grown almost doubleevery single year, year after year.
(20:20):
Started out with a couple,you know, when I was there, it
was probably two or 300 cars.
Started out as an allCorvette only auction.
Think in conjunction with anNCRS event that was down there.
Dana decided to open up to alltypes of cars and it really just
took fire and never looked back.
And it has, it's grown and grownexponentially year after year
to somewhere around 2010 ish.
It, the hold is the world's largestelectric car auction with the volume
(20:43):
of cars that were at one event.
And continue to grow past that.
We're pushing 5,000 cars now, sofrom 50 cars behind the laundromat
to 5,000 cars in 13 days long,it has just become a spectacle.
It's the greatest car show on earth, inmy opinion, far as where you can see,
you know, every type of vehicle that youcan imagine is there that week, and it
really sets the tone for the collectivecar market for the rest of the year.
(21:05):
How do you guys go about, youknow, having that volume of cars,
obviously over multiple days.
How do you start organizing, okay,we're gonna have these go on this day,
these on this day, and I love it, themoniker, leading up to Super Saturday
when you have all the big hitters.
I mean, how do you guys kind of go about.
Figuring out what goes where.
Anytime you put four to 5,000 carsin, in one place, you know, how
(21:26):
do you disseminate what needs togo where and how do you do that?
And we do that by value.
You know, the, the weekends are ourmost attended events, both the first
weekend and the second weekend arethe, are the most heavily attended.
So, you know, the, the veryfirst day, day one will be,
you know, relatively expensive.
What we like to refer to asentry level collectibles.
Things of people that are just lookingto get into the market, dip their toe
in the water and, and get into it.
(21:47):
We've got a lot more affordablecars in those early days.
Sort of apex and lead ourselvesinto that first weekend.
And we get some really great cars.
That first weekend type of quality youwould see in some of our bigger days at
at some of our other events throughoutthe country throughout the year.
And then we do a bit of a reset.
There's sort of two big crowds.
You have the first weekend crowd,which is a little bit more regional.
Then the, the national and internationalcrowd starts to come in day after day
(22:09):
as we lead into the second weekend.
So Tuesday is slightly smaller, thenit gets bigger on Wednesday, which
gets bigger on Thursday, biggerto Friday, and then onto Saturday.
And everything culminates atthe, the peak on Saturday.
So Friday and Saturday, the secondweekend are our two biggest days.
It's heavy metal from startto finish on both those days.
So the cool thing is, anyone that'sin the hobby or whatever level you can
(22:29):
get involved in Kissimmee and be a partof it and connect with it, you know,
whether as a buyer or a seller, buteven as you know, from a spectator's
perspective, to see cars that arepretty attainable up to the aspirational
vehicles that to watch these guys.
Trading high dollar, extremely valuablecars into that second weekend is,
is what makes Kissimmee so special.
Great.
'cause a lot of people, either it is theirfirst collectible, the only collectible
they're gonna buy, but to your point isthere's something there for everyone.
(22:51):
Not just price point,but style, genre heavy.
I mean, there's somethingthere for everybody.
You know, in cars like this, GTO thatwe're talking about here, I mean obviously
is the headliner for Saturday, the secondweekend as Kissimmee continue to grow
and the international attention that itreceives and the amount of people that
come to it, all 50 states in the, in theUnited States and, and from, I think it
was 30 different countries around theworld that participate in this event.
(23:13):
The fact that we have that big of anaudience and that amount of eyeballs
focused on one location at one pointin time has really opened the eyes
to a lot of folks to realize thatif I wanna sell my car and I wanna
bring the most attention to it in oneplace and and maximize the exposure,
Kissimmee is the place to do that.
And I think that the more and morepeople realize, you know, you can take
a car like this and go to Montereyand compete with six different auction
(23:34):
events going on the same weekend,on the same day at the same time.
Or you can put this car on apedestal in front of an international
audience that's arguably bigger.
And find success being a multi-dayevent over, you know, a week
and a half, two weeks roughly.
What other events also go on during that?
It's not 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM it'scars going across the block.
What else do you guys have going on there?
Well, it is 8:00 AM to 8:00PM with cars going across.
(23:56):
Oh, it across the block.
Oh, okay.
That does happen.
Oh yeah.
No, we're bell to be, we'reselling 350 on or on some of the
days, almost 400 cars in a day.
To sell that many, that amountof cars, you have to work that
hard and, and work that long.
But the event itself, we've gotentertainment going outside with music
and things going outside an adventurezone for kids, for families to come out
and enjoy themselves and they can getinvolved and do, you know, automotive
(24:16):
orientated events with the kids?
We'll have speakers and, and seminarsgoing on at our midway stage out front.
We do car parades, you know, the carsdon't just sit on display forever
until they're time to go to the block.
We do some hand selects and we docar parades across our midways like
we like to call it, so folks cansit and watch the cars, run, drive,
listen to 'em, huge food truck area.
I think over a dozen food trucksthat are out there with all different
(24:37):
types of food for people to getinvolved with and, and hang out.
It's just a, from a car enthusiastperspective, it's like Disneyland
or Disney World, I shouldsay, as we're in Orlando, but.
There's just a tongue going on.
It's a, it's very stimulatingthis day and age too.
How has, you know, working socialmedia, YouTube, and obviously you
guys are broadcasting now too, howhas that changed your guys' approach
and has that really helped you guysacquire and grow in regards, not just
(25:00):
volume, but cars, you guys are getting.
We're very much also inthe entertainment business.
Our auctions are broadcast liveon ESPN, ESPN Plus we launched,
uh, mecom TV on the Roku channel.
So we have 24 7 Mecu auctions rolling.
We're produc content for that.
We've, we're nearing a show on,on the GTO, on Mecu tv, you know,
between YouTube and all the contentwe produce for that social media.
(25:21):
Insta, we have a, a whole team dedicatedto social media from Instagram.
Facebook and TikTok and all the like, andyou know, we're very much an entertainment
company just as much as we are an auctioncompany now, with the kind of cars
across our block and the, and the thecool stories that we're able to tell.
We've got content coming out of ourears and we love telling the story
about video and it's, it's fun.
It's why, it's why I got into this.
(25:41):
Yeah.
I mean that's one great thing aboutthis industry or just cars itself, is
knowing the story behind a lot of it.
'cause a lot, every car's got a story.
It's fantastic to learn a lotof these things and delving into
those creates, I don't wanna saya mystique, but it really kind of
can grow and make that car special.
No, absolutely.
I mean, the amount of cars thatwe see year after year, I think
Chris wouldn't feel the same.
I mean, we're in the cars are our work.
(26:01):
That's our life.
That's what we do dayin, day out every day.
But when you find a car with a greatstory behind it and the people that
you meet because of that story or theconnections that you make because of
that, that's what makes this stuff cool.
The cars are great and then people ask usall the time, what's your favorite car?
What car do you want?
It's, to me, it changes all the time.
I mean, it's, it's about the peopleand the stories that you hear and
learn and the connections that youmake along the way is what makes
(26:22):
this this hobby super cool and funand, and great to be a part of.
Looking at it, we have 70 plus Ferrari.
As of now, basically going acrossthe block down and kissing me.
You know, obviously Callate inthe GTO, but you have a very, very
nice selection of Ferraris thatare gonna be crossing that block.
Absolutely.
Probably one of the best collections ofFerraris that we've ever offered for sale.
Yeah.
The Bachman collection, whichwe'll do in a couple weeks.
(26:44):
We're gonna do an episodeon that one as well.
'cause there's some very specialvehicles in that one as well.
Mm-hmm.
Chris, I'm gonna have you kind oftouch on this, MECU, obviously what
they're getting now and get involvedin the level of cars they're doing.
I mean, it's just top notch.
What was the choice?
I mean, going to Mecu, what was thethought about, hey, let's, this car
is gonna be best served at Mecu?
So what happened was, originally Iwas at Retro Mobile in Paris and you
(27:07):
know, doing your normal visits, you'remeeting all the different people.
I bumped into one ofthe Pebble Beach judges.
His name is Richard Ado.
He is also an author and writessome great books on French cars.
We had a really good dinner together.
You know, we met the year beforeand had dinner as well, and then the
following day he went back to Washington.
He is a very good friend of John Shirley.
A couple weeks later we had theevent that was at Amelia Island, and
(27:28):
I see Richard as I'm checking outtathe hotel and he says to me, uh.
Hey, where you heading back to?
I said, I'm heading back toOrlando, catching a flight.
He said, you mind if I tag along?
So he jumps in the car.
We're probably an hour into the ride,and he looks at me and he says, Hey,
you got anybody for John's two 50 GTO?
I almost went off the road to behonest with you, and I looked at
him and I said, you're serious?
He said, yeah.
(27:49):
And the first person that popped in mymind was Dana, because Dana's a collector.
I picked up the phone that evening.
I called Dana and we had a chat.
Dana said, listen, you know, I was alreadyinvolved with helping Dana with the 2
75 lm. We were restoring that car, and Iwas looking after that project in Italy.
I said to him, which is, is this somethingyou'd want to add to the collection?
And he said, you know what?
(28:10):
Let's have a conversation with John.
We had a conversation with John.
We went out there and Dana, John,myself, we all sat together.
The decision was made 'cause itwasn't something that Dana was
gonna put into his collection.
It was best suited tobring it to public auction.
Obviously John's still the owner ofthe car, and we connected Dana and
John together and it was a match madein heaven, as they say, because as Sam
(28:31):
pointed out, you know, and you pointed outthere's over 70 cars going to Kissimmee.
We're gonna talk about the Bachmancollection in the future, which
is a real special collection.
To my knowledge, I don't know ofany Ferrari collection or this
amount of Ferraris that's ever beenpresented at one auction at one
time, ever, at any point in time.
So it's super exciting.
(28:52):
You know Dana, from a personal level,he's got a an amazing Ferrari collection.
He's a real true connoisseur to the brand.
He shows his cars.
He's obviously involved with Pebble Beach.
He does the Caino events, hedoes the Amelia Island events.
Dana's obviously the right guythat's personally involved.
It's not just a business.
Dana has a true love for the cars.
I really honestly felt, you know, whenthe conversation came up and it just
(29:14):
evolved so quickly, it really, really,really went well and it was great to
be part of it, to see the meeting withJohn and obviously with Dana together.
It was, it was a great, great timeand it's, and it's worked out well.
That's what awesome thing about Danais, you know, he is a true collector.
I mean, he has a passion for these carsas well, and seeing his unbelievable
collections, you know, fantastic as well.
When Dana kind of dropped thatbomb on everyone else at Mecu,
(29:37):
what was the thoughts andenthusiasm around the offices?
Our marketing team gotextremely excited really quick.
I mean, you know, obviously, you know,the nice thing is, you know when,
when you're as promoters of auctionsand you know, with headliners and
headliners like this, especially to get.
As early as we're able to do and be ableto kick off our Kissimmee campaigns with
a car of this magnitude was excitingfor all of us and to, you know, really,
(30:00):
you know, set the tone, set the toneearly and March towards January.
I mean, we, we announced the,the GTO was coming to Kissimmee.
We announced it in Monterey inAugust, that our auction air being
able to, to launch the campaigns forKissimmee in the middle of August
with a headliner like this, GTO.
It was the best.
We were excited.
Not just that car, but the amountof other Ferrari they're gonna be
(30:20):
crossing the block and kissing me.
This is really gonna kind of set thetone for the market because you know
you have your top end, I'm not gonnasay bottom end with like some three
oh eights and three 20 eights, but.
This is really gonna kind ofset the tone in regards to where
the market's going into 2026.
In my mind, it's kind of a bigresponsibility in regards to all
the eyes that are gonna be onYou guys we're up to that task.
(30:42):
That challenge in Kissimmee for yearsnow has been that market tone setter
for whatever type of vehicle forall the different markets, right?
So.
Whether it be muscle cars orCorvettes or Ferraris or, or whatever.
I mean, you know, the fact that wekick it off in January, we start
the year off with such a bang withthis auction, it sets the tone for
the market for the rest of the year.
No doubt about it.
So we do it on an annual basis andwe're excited to do it for Ferrari.
(31:03):
As you delve into these more,do you guys see yourself.
Stick into your true path in regardsto how you guys do your auctions?
Or do you see yourself doing somethinga little different with like, say,
a separate high end type situation?
We do it all together, but we also, wedo what's necessary for the different
types of vehicles and set the stage.
I mean the displays that we puttogether and produce in Kissimmee or
(31:25):
our second to none, and we will do thesecars justice for what they deserve.
And you know, having the opportunityto have these on display is a hell
of an attraction for the peoplethat come just to watch the show.
But to segregate.
Where we position these cars in theauction, how we put 'em on display, how
we represent them, how we present them.
It's taken Kissimmee to another level.
Once again, as I described, as wecontinue this growth trajectory for
(31:46):
Kissimmee and adding this layer on topof what's already extremely successful
and, and has become the world's largestcollector car auction, they have this
on top of that is, is incredible.
We're proud to do it.
We're proud, we're excited to have it.
We're pleased that the, you know, thesellers have given us the opportunity
to present these cars for sale atauction in Kissimmee, and we're
excited to see what the results.
Yeah, it's gonna be a packedroom, that's for sure.
(32:07):
And I know I plan on trying to be therefor it as well, especially seeing all this
go across because it's gonna be fantastic.
Yep.
Chris, when was the last time your GTOcrossed the block open auction like this?
A couple years ago, there was onethat passed over the block and
there was a series two that passed.
There's never been a white one.
No.
That's what sets this car apart and, andlook, you know, we kind of touched on it
earlier about, you know, Sam mentionedit, I talked about it a little bit, John,
(32:30):
how involved he was and some of themcars, you know, they've been restored.
There was one that was totally restoredand it, you know, it didn't look like
that obviously when it left the factoryin 62 or 63 when that particular car left.
This car has a realperiod correct feel to it.
It's just an amazing car.
And then, you know, on top ofit you have the hot rod motor.
(32:50):
It's white.
The provenance of who owned the car,who drove the car, Mike Parks, Graham
Hill, former, the one world champion.
You got really, really, really specialpeople that race this car in period.
It's, it's a real special car.
It really is.
Obviously to bid on this car price wise,where, and I'm not gonna get into say,
Hey, what do you think it's gonna go for?
Because we're not even gonna touch that.
(33:12):
What does someone gotta do for a carat that level, registering, whatnot.
I mean, is there anything different theyhave to do that wouldn't be say, under
different from standard, just registeringto bid every situation's different.
Obviously, you know, there relationshipsare big components of this and you know.
You know, if we have someone that'scomes out of nowhere from, you
know, somewhere in Europe or that,that we're not aware of, obviously
(33:32):
there'll be conversations that'llhave, and we'll set their financial
verification up, get 'em registeredto bid with an understanding that they
have the means to purchase that car.
And, you know, ens are, are alwayshelpful and, and things like that,
but you know, it, it gets a car likethis, it gets to be a case by case.
I mean, you know, rarely do you havesomeone that just goes and registers a
bid online and just, you know, pops outtathe woodwork, you know, but it's, it's
(33:54):
not to say it's never happened, but it.
Yeah, I mean, it's, it's an easy process.
Getting registered is easy, you know,getting a hold of us and having a
conversation with our bid servicesteam and, and getting connected.
Chris obviously is, is helpingwith his context and throughout the
country and, and around the world.
It's not a overly complex process,but you know, you can't just log
in and push a button without anytype of financial verification.
Bid, bid, bid, yeah.
(34:15):
Your media pass request hasprobably gone through the roof.
Yeah, there's a lot of,a lot of media attention.
There's a lot of, you know, a lot comingin on that actually, you know, vetting
some of these, you know, some of thesemedia folks is probably more difficult
than vetting some of these high networkindividuals with, on your Roku channel.
You guys are gonna doing a, aspecial on this car specifically,
(34:36):
and I would assume that on theRoku gets played multiple times.
Yeah, it'll rear multiple times.
I think it's gonna rear air fourtimes a day after we premiere
it Thursday, November 6th.
It will premier at 8:00 PMEastern on Mecu CV on Roku.
And then after premieres it'll,it'll cycle through and re-air, I
think four times a day between nowand Kissimmee auction in January.
You know, be sure to, uh, check outall of Mecu M'S social media pages
(34:57):
and sites 'cause they are doing awonderful job showcasing that, what
that car is and just how special it is.
'cause it's unbelievable.
And I'm really excited about this auction.
It's gonna be the biggest.
Ferrari auction at oneplace on one time ever.
You're never gonna see the quality ofcars at one place, at one venue that
you're gonna see at this auction.
This is gonna be historic and like Samsaid, greatest spectacle on sports.
(35:21):
They always used to say was the Indy 500.
Well, this would be the greatestspectacle in in auctions for sure.
This is.
You gotta be part of it.
This is a moment in history, you know,it's one of those things, it only comes
and happens every so often and I thinkthis is gonna be a really special moment
and this car's gonna really be strongand I'm really excited to see, 'cause
you know, not just this one, but all theother fris gonna be crossing the block.
(35:42):
This is a moment in Ferrari history inregards to what's gonna be happening.
'cause there's a lot of special vehicles.
Again, I appreciate you guys coming on.
Uh, I look forward in a couple weeks.
We're gonna come back.
We're gonna visit the Bachmancollection, which is also gonna be
crossing the block down in Kissie.
And that one's gonna bespectacular in its, its own right.
The quality and what the cars arein that collection is unbelievable.
And Chris will be back.
(36:02):
Sam, we'll be back.
And to everyone listening, appreciateyou tuning in and stay tuned
till uh, next time you got it.
Thank you.
Alright, thanks guys.
Bye-bye.
Nobody sells more than Mecu.
Nobody.
Mecom Auctions is the world's leaderof collector car vintage and antique
motorcycle and road art sales hostingauctions throughout the United States.
(36:22):
The company had specialized in thesale of collector cars for more than
35 years now, offering more than22,000 lots per year and averaging
more than one auction per month.
Mecom Auctions is headquartered inWalworth, Wisconsin, and since 2011
has been ranked number one in the worldwith the number of collective cars
(36:44):
offered at auction, and is host to theworld's largest collector car auction
held annually in Kissimmee, Florida, aswell as the largest motorcycle auction
held annually in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Mes, road Art and Mecu on Time.
Divisions offer a wide variety ofcollectibles for live and online auctions.
You can learn more and follow Mecu andtheir upcoming events@www.mecu.com,
(37:12):
or you can follow them on socialat Mecca Auction on Facebook
at Mecom Auctions on Instagram.
At Ika on Twitter and atMicham auction on YouTube.
For everything from Ferrari andPorsche, Lamborghini and Konig seg,
visit exotic car marketplace.com.
If you're into anything with wheelsand a motor, log onto the Motoring
(37:34):
Podcast network and check out ourfamily of podcasts@motoringpodcast.net.
This is the place to findyour favorite new show.
Next up a shout out to DavidBeatie and his team at Slot mods.
Who custom build some of the coolest slotcar tracks in the world@slotmods.com.
Let your imagination run wild.
And finally, grand touring motorsportscovering all aspects of auto
(37:58):
racing and motorsports history.
Check out their ezine@gtmotorsports.org.
All the links for our sponsorsare in the description.
This episode has been brought to youby Grand Touring Motorsports as part
of our Motoring Podcast network.
For more episodes like this, tune in eachweek for more exciting and educational
(38:21):
content from organizations like TheExotic Car Marketplace, the Motoring
Historian, break Fix, and many others.
If you'd like to support GrandTouring Motor Sports and the Motoring
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Please note that the content,opinions and materials presented and
(38:41):
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