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Waiting for the moment to ignite their dreams on the asphalt
He sat across from Enzo Ferrari and explained the problem. He said he had a solution. He said that a car so important, so expensive, should not break down so frequently. Ferrari listened. Then he dismissed him. The exact words vary depending on who tells the story, legend never fixes itself completely, but the meaning was unmistakable: stick to tractors, we know how to make cars. There was contempt in that sentence. There was the certainty that an Emilian farmer, however rich he had become, could know nothing about luxury cars. There was the insult that transformed him from a customer into his greatest competitor for the years to come. [Arca Arcana; Italian version]
posted by chavenet on Apr 14, 2026 at 4:05 AM
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As much as I love the story, the line "He had built the car without defects, indeed various cars without defects." is really stretching the truth based on everything I've ever heard about Lamborghinis of the 1960s and 70s.
posted by Ickster at 4:23 AM
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Yeah, Lambos of that era aren't exactly known for their reliability. Same for Ferraris, of course.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:29 AM
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"At least our defects are not the same as your defects" is what keeps these kinds of feuds going for generations.
posted by at by at 5:06 AM
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Yeah I mean this story is from the Lamborghini museum, written by the chief Lamborghini test driver. Not exactly unbiased journalism here. So should be taken with a grain of salt.
posted by vacapinta at 6:04 AM
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Lamborghini is the ultimate spite business.
posted by Headfullofair at 6:33 AM
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It is certainly a choice to present "collaborating with Nazis" as a life choice to admired and emulated in ann official corporate hagiography.
posted by infinitewindow at 7:23 AM
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I appreciate that this mentions Carroll Shelby. The intro to this post immediately made me think of him.
A perfect parallel is found on the other side of the Atlantic, in the story of Carroll Shelby and the Shelby Cobra. Shelby was an ex-pilot Texan who had understood something different from Enzo Ferrari: that a fast car could also be reliable, that luxury did not have to be the enemy of performance. When Shelby took an AC chassis, mounted an American engine on it, and transformed it into a legendary machine, he was doing exactly what Ferruccio was doing: offering a democratic vision of speed.
Lamborghini built luxury cars that beat Ferrari. Shelby built race cars that beat Ferrari. Ford v Ferrari is a surprisingly moving film about this.
Apparently Lamborghini recently started competing at Le Mans as well.
I'm curious who else got annoyed at Ferrari and decided to create cars to beat them.
This also made me wonder when we'll see more EVs in endurance races like Le Mans—this is an interesting exploration of the difficulties of that.
posted by limeonaire at 9:07 AM
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From this story I take the lesson that the way to improve the world is to go around and insult people. :)
posted by storybored at 12:09 PM
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This also made me wonder when we'll see more EVs in endurance races like Le Mans—this is an interesting exploration of the difficulties of that.
Not that the other points aren't valid but the author greatly over estimates the difficulty of providing a connector for swappable battery packs. EVs operate at 400-800V and max amp draw of formula e cars is around 400A. 600V isn't even technically high voltage. An industrial plant will have 600v 60/100A plugs scattered around for welders that work basically like any household receptacle. 600v/600A plug bus connectors are already a solved problem in industrial switch gear. Engineering would be required for the operating environment (vibration) but it would almost certainly be possible. And as far as handling weight that's what equipment is for. A mounting system like a scaled up battery drill slide on pack, a fancy powered cart to handle alignment and sliding in and out, and Robert is your mother's brother.
posted by Mitheral at 4:15 PM
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I mean. The first Lotus was built the year after the first Ferrari but on a completely different premise: "What if we built a car with absolutely no creature comforts that was ALSO mechanically and electrically unreliable?"
posted by 1adam12 at 5:01 PM
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In the deposits of war surplus, there was material abandoned by the Allies. Carts, tanks, Morris airplane engines.
In one of the volumes of My Brilliant Friend the girls walk too far out of town. They pass abandoned tanks by the road. Liquid-holding tanks, or armed tanks?, I wondered.
posted by clew at 7:34 PM
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I'm curious who else got annoyed at Ferrari and decided to create cars to beat them.
Famously, the garagistas of Formula 1 during the '70s who were beginning to experiment with aerodynamics because, according to Enzo Ferrari, they only did that because they couldn't build proper engines.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 9:23 PM
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