Ex Formula 1 Driver Martin Brundle Ferrari 360 Modena At Auction

Want to buy a Ferrari 360 Modena owned by ex Formula One driver Martin Brundle? Here is your chance. H&H Auctioneers have the car Brundle bought new back in the year 2000.

Being a professional racing driver, he of course specified a manual gearbox making this a rarer car as many came with the F1 automated manual. There were only 352 UK cars supplied with the traditional three pedal option. The car also comes with a comprehensive service history and only 34,000 miles from new. It’s also in a rather nice combination of Argento Nurburgring silver over with Bordeaux red. The interior colour contrasting nicely with the exterior, suits the car well.

The Ferrari 360 was built from 1999 until 2005 and came with a completely new aluminium space frame, which was 40% stiffer than the predecessor which used steel. The sharper angled styling had gone and so had the traditional pop up headlights. Still a Pininfaria effort, but quite different to the 355 before. The car was bigger too, but also lighter thanks to the use of aluminium.

Martin Brundle is still a well-known figure in the world of Formula One having joined the late Murray Walker in the commentary booth back in 1997. It was in this period he bought the car which would have been used around the road of Norfolk, Brundle’s home county.

Son of a car dealer he started racing grass track in a Ford Anglia back in 1972 before moving up to Hot Rods in 1975. not the route you’ll find with many professional drivers today. But in 1979 he started racing Formula Ford and driving for Tom Walkinshaw’s BMW touring car team. In 1980 he raced with Stirling Moss in the Audi 80 for team TWR BP. He progressed from there to Formula Three in 1982 only a year later competing against Ayrton Senna and narrowly losing the championship. He was offered a drive in the 1984 Formula One championship with Tyrell, unfortunately a crash where he broke both ankles put him out for a large part of the season. He stayed with Tyrrell until 1987 where he moved to Zakspeed.

Sportcars is where Brundle immediately excelled, in 1988 he won the Sportscar Championship driving for TWR in a Jaguar XJR-9. He was able to win at Le Mans two years later with the XJR-12.

He did another stint in Formula One in 1989, more sportscars in 1990, but 1991 saw him place with a well-funded team, Benetton. Not only that he was driving with teammate Michael Schumacher and out drove him on several occasions only to be dropped by the team that year. He secured a drive with Ligier and stayed with them for two years in a lesser car with no active suspension. He still managed to place 7th overall in 1993.

The 1994 season was with McLaren who had a particularly bad year and suffered greatly with reliability. So, it was back to Ligier where he got onto the podium for the final time in 1995 at Spa. In 1996 he signed to Jordan for his final year and his best placed result was fourth.

Brundle seems something of an underrated driver these days. But if you see his racing against Senna, you could see a real talent. He proved that in Sportscar racing, but if he’d had enough luck landing a drive with the right team, I think he’d have been champion. Maybe I’m biased, but I’ve always been a fan. I’m from Norfolk so that’s my excuse.

The car will be at the upcoming auction at the Imperial War Museum, Duxford on the 26th May 2021. The good news is that viewing is available on Tuesday 25th May from 12pm to 6pm and Wednesday 26th May 2021 from 9am to 6pm.

See the H&H Auctioneers website for more details.