The Ontario-based auction house hit the headlines when it sold a similar car, once owned by Hollywood star James Coburn, for 7,040,000 euros (then the equivalent of $10.9m), at its 18 May 2008 Maranello sale.
By coincidence, the ‘similarity’ of this example (chassis 3119 GT) extends to the fact that both it and the Coburn car were purchased new by Fredy Damman from Jacques Swaters’ Garage Francorchamps in Belgium. And both subsequently made the trip to the USA.
As a California Spider it’s rare, as only some 106 were built. As a short wheelbase car (‘SWB’) it’s rarer still, with only 56 of the 106 so constructed. And of that 56 – please bear with us here, it’s important – RM understands that “only about 37 were delivered in the most desirable of all configurations: the very attractive covered-headlamp variant.”
It is, in other words, ‘the best of the best’, and a car that has already enjoyed a class win at Pebble Beach.
Estimated at $7,500,000 - 9,000,000, chassis 3119 GT also has the all-important Ferrari Classiche certification and ‘matching numbers’. It will be auctioned on Saturday, 18 August at RM’s familiar Portola Plaza Hotel & Spa venue in Monterey.
Photos: RM Auctions / shooterz.biz
