In the late fifties, after the racing disaster at Le Mans in 1955, the Commission Sportive Internationale was moved to implement new rules to make sports car racing safer. Ferrari forecasted there would be a reduction in sports car capacity as a result, which lead them to design on a racing gem powered by a 3-liter, V-12 engine.
The first prototype to roll out of the production line was a four-cylinder 500 TR. Because its cam covers were painted a fire red color, they dubbed it the Testa Rossa, meaning the “red head.” The new name stuck when final production of the V-12 was finished.
There were a total of twenty-one 250 Testarossas that were built, including all its prototypes, as well as the 330 TRI/LM. The 714TR, Ferrari’s fourth Testa Rossa, was sold to racecar driver Piero Drogo, who was living in Modena. His family eventually migrated to Venezuela, where Piero took his new prized car to task and raced it extensively.
Drogo shipped it overseas, where he successfully competed in some minor European events. The Texas racer, Alan Connell, bought the 1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa through Luigi Chinetti in 1958. Connell also raced it extensively in the SCCA National events. It then changed several hands and was raced extensively when Connell sold it back to Chinetti.
In the early sixties, the original engine was removed and replaced by the a unit from the 0770 TR. Burnett raced it several more times before it exchanged into the hands of Robert Dusek in 1970. He restored it with most of its original specifications, including reinstalling the initial 0714 engine. The majority of original 250 TRs have been decommissioned as prized classics, acquired by sophisticated and wealthy collectors and out-of-reach to the general public.
