The karat kid
The Oulton Park Gold Cup is a special event, and a great chance for the VSCC to share the stage at a truly prestigious meeting, so there was a huge…
Those who doubt that cars should ever be described as works of art have probably never seen one of Maserati’s Tipo 60/61 racers built from 1959 to ’61.
By then the Trident marque had abandoned its own grand prix racing programme and shifted focus to building cars for privateer use – but, in order to be competitive, its products needed to be technologically ahead of the game.
It was with that aim that chief designer Giulio Alfieri came up with the idea of creating a light but strong spaceframe using a carefully calculated arrangement of 200 small-diameter steel tubes welded together.
The resulting structure’s criss-cross of pipework earned the nickname ‘Birdcage’ and ensured the complete car weighed little more than 570kg which, with the 200bhp engine from the 200S fitted, made for a healthy power-to weight ratio of 350bhp per tonne and a maximum speed that was in the region of 170mph.
The Tipo 60 quickly proved its worth with a maiden outing victory at the 1959 Rouen Grand Prix in the hands of Stirling Moss, who defeated two works Lotus 15s. This aroused interest from US buyers, who fancied the car’s chances in the 3-litre class.
Maserati obliged by increasing the cylinder capacity to 2890cc which, while other necessary engine mods added 29kg in weight, also endowed the car with an extra 50bhp.
The first example of the new Tipo 61 went to Lloyd ‘Lucky’ Casner in the US for his Camoradi team, with Moss taking the chequered flag at the 1960 Cuban GP in one of the three other Tipo 61s that Casner subsequently bought.
The Birdcage concept proved itself in numerous events, leading to the design being adapted to a mid-engined configuration in the Tipo 63, 64 and 65 models – yet the Tipo 61 remains the quintessential version.
But with 60 and 61s having been built in just 22 examples between them, originals are rare and seldom on the open market, which is why the celebrated historic car engineering duo of Dick Crosthwaite and John Gardiner – makers of more than half a dozen replica Auto Union Type Ds for Audi – embarked on a project in 1989 to build a run of three exact ‘toolroom copies’ of a Tipo 61.
The example offered by William I’Anson on behalf of its owner is the third and final of those, having been completed in 2004 to the order of the late competition car collector Rodney Smith, who recruited Mark Gillies to race it in VSCC and HGPCA series.
After Smith’s death the car was bought by US enthusiast Paddins Dowling before being acquired around five years ago by the current owner, who has used it at the GRRC Sprint and at RAC concours events.
Being sold with current FIA HTP papers and a useful spares package, it represents a decidedly rare chance to experience a Tipo 61 that could fairly be described as being just how the originals were when they left the Maserati factory almost 75 years ago.
And although William I’Anson prefers to reveal the price only ‘on application’, we can tell you that it’s a good deal less money than you might expect.
For sale with William I’Anson, Cirencester, £POA. williamianson.com
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