The marathon relay celebrating Ferrari’s 60th anniversary arrived in Mexico City on last Saturday, March 17th. Dozens of Ferrari owners and hundreds of guests gathered at the grand opening of Ferrari importer Scuderia Mondiale’s new showroom in Mexico City’s prestigious Polanco district to celebrate this important birthday for Ferrari.

In a video message from Italy, Ferrari President Luca Cordero di Montezemolo greeted the guests and stressed the great passion that Mexico has always felt for racing and for Ferrari. During the evening The Honorable Felice Scauso, Ambassador of Italy to Mexico, received a gift from dealer principal Ricardo Vega, which will be auctioned off in a charity event that will take place at Ferrari’s Maranello headquarters – at the end of the relay celebrations in June.

The Ferrari 60 Relay involves over 10,000 Ferrari owners and their cars of all ages. They act as symbolic “bearers” of a specially commissioned relay baton adorned with 60 badges symbolizing the most extraordinary events in the marque’s 60-year history. The relay started in Abu Dhabi and made its way across the Middle East to Asia, Australia and Africa before arriving at its first stop in the Americas; Miami. From there it proceeded to Brazil before arriving in Mexico. Next the relay will will make stops in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Toronto and Montreal before its last U.S. stop going from New York to Washington D.C. The relay will then move to all main European countries before arriving at the Ferrari factory in Maranello, Italy on June 23rd.

The relay baton was designed and created to symbolize Ferrari’s history and is topped by a dazzling platinum and diamond Prancing Horse made by Damiani. It also features 60 enamel symbols designed by the Intesta e D’Adda, Lorenzini, Vigorelli and BBDO advertising agencies, and the creative talents Allessando Migliorini of Area Creativa, Marco Morosini, Enzo Naso of the eponymous studio and Wolfgang Seidl of Seidldesign.

As part of its 60th anniversary celebrations, Ferrari will build a series of 60 truly unique cars. These will be based on the 612 Scaglietti, the Prancing Horse’s range-topping Granturismo which combines handcrafted trim, state-of-the-art accessories and meticulous attention to detail. The cars will be offered with a two-tone livery in a combination of classic Ferrari colours as used on some of the Prancing Horse’s most memorable models.
 

The interior appointments will feature sophisticated colour combinations and a stunning new-generation electrochromic glass roof, itself a major innovation. The degree of opacity of the roof, in fact, can be adjusted to suit the occupant’s requirements. To underline the exclusivity of this series of one-offs, each example will also boast an enamelled symbol set on the central tunnel representing one of the 60 historic events chosen to celebrate the marque’s anniversary. The result is a true collector’s car aimed at Ferrari’s most dedicated clients.

Meanwhile, just as the Ferrari 60 Relay was making its way through Mexico last weekend, the Maranello sports car maker was kicking off the 2007 racing season in two international disciplines in triumphant style on two continents. While Kimi Raikkonen was racing from a lights-to-flag victory at the wheel of the new F2007 in the Australian Formula One Grand Prix, the F430GT sports car, prepared by the Corse Clienti department in Maranello, won the GT2 class of the prestigious "12 Hours" of Sebring (Florida). It was the first race of the American Le Mans Series. The result was further enhanced by the Finnish driver Mika Salo who, along with the Englishman Johnny Mowlem and the Brazilian Jaime Melo, is part of the Risi Competizione Team. It was Melo who drove the car on the last stint, defending it against the Porsche of Bergmeister/Lieb/van Overbeek in a fierce duel with an advantage of just two tenths of a second at the end of the race, which will definitely enter into the history of this "12 Hours" race in its 55th edition and of the championship itself.

First in the LMP1 category were Pirro/Biela/Werner in Audi, while the LMP2 category and in the GT1 category the victories were by Franchitti/Kanaan/Herta (Acura) and Papis/Gavin/Beretta (Corvette) respectively. This coming weekend the other motor sport activities of the Prancing Horse will start at the Autodromo in Monza with the Italian and the European series of the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli - Shell Cup. While on the Chinese race track of Zhuhai the FIA GT Championship will start its first race of the year. In this case another Finn - Toni Vilander, a close friend of Raikkonen - will aim for success in one of the Ferrari F430GTs to be run by the AF Corse Motorola Team.