A story about the fate of Rob Walker's 1961 Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB Competizione.

There are only 3 right-hand driven 250 GT/B SWB/C’s in the world, and the man you see in the picture standing next to chassis nr.2735GT is not the owner, never has been, instead it’s the driver. Now? no… in 1961. The original owner of the man is Rob Walker, who supplied this driver (Sir Stirling Moss) with cars regularly, including the Cooper-Climax in which he had his career ending crash. So who is (today) the owner? Clive Beecham. He has 2 cars of which this is his favourite, his other car is a 1950 Ferrari 166MM Berchetta chassis nr.0064MM, an originally French 166, he has the 24th unit, you think it’s an early unit? quite the oppisite, it’s the 24th of only 25!

If you want to know something about a specific Ferrari, you can use the Barchetta website, I now know for instance that Beecham bought it in 2012 under it’s 8th registration number, and also is the 8th owner, and that in 1952 the 166 was given a triple carburettor conversion. Handy, ‘innit? Something else cool, is that both of his Ferraris are in their factory fresh specification, both were dark blue.

back to his Berlinetta though; in ‘84 (the year Beecham bought this beaut) the plate changed to 1SWB and he drove it every now and again at the Goodwood circuit and showed up at a number of events with it from off ‘92, and Stirling also drove it in ‘98, in 2007-2009 the car was restored by Ferrari Classiche and “re-delivered” to Sir Stirling Moss (though still under ownership of Beecham), and in 2011 the Ferrari has seen the last of it’s action as it was driven around Goodwood by Sir Stirling Moss himself.

Across time it’s had it’s fair share of engine and body changes, for instance; 1962 it was painted silver and rebodied by Piero Drogo, in ‘64 it was painted metallic green, in ‘67 it’s engine was installed in a 250 GTO (chassis nr.3729GT) and had the engine from a 250 GTE (chassis nr.2625GT) put in it’s place, in ‘80 it had a new SWB body by Grand Prix Metalcraft installed with it’s Drogo body put on a 250 GTE (chassis nr.3611GT) and then in ‘84 bought by Beecham where it was later brought back to the state it was in 1961.

So what do you think? wouldn’t it be an honor to have Sir Stirling Moss’ 250 Berlinetta as one of your 2 cars in you garage?

• MH

(edit) this isn’t Walker’s only 250 GT Berlinetta, there’s also chassis nr.2119GT, with which Moss won the Goodwood TT in 1960, and won his hatrick, it is now owned by Ross Brawn, which he drove at the Goodwood Revival in 2015, together with Sir Stirling Moss. And I want to make this an annual thing, the 5 days of Ferrari, where I will (for 5 days consecutively) upload the history of a certain chassis number, I’ve already got 3 more stories ready, if you have a suggestion, tell me in the comments below what car and chassis number and I’ll try and make a post on it.