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Ferrari 512M: The best way imaginable to lose Le Mans
7 hours ago
For sheer thrills, Brundle would rather race a 512M than anything else
For the 512, context is everything. In 1969, Porsche had done the apparently impossible and simply steamrollered its way around rules designed specifically to exclude the possibility of such a car ever being built. Pure prototypes of its kind were assembled by the handful in the past, so rules mandating that at least 25 should be built and presented before even one was allowed to race would surely do the job. Well, surely not. If the photograph of two-and-a-bit dozen 917s being presented to the authorities is jaw-dropping today, imagine how Maranello saw it in 1969. The 512 was a reaction to that car, giving Porsche an entire year of development time before Ferrari could turn a wheel in anger.
Even then, the car simply wasn’t ready. To get anywhere near the Porsches it had to run flat-out all the time, and it wasn’t strong enough. The gearbox, clutch and indeed engine could not tolerate all the torque, and the V12 was so unbelievably loud that even professional race drivers struggled to drive a full stint amid the heat and vibration. Today, footage of these cars running is scarce, despite a considerable number of real and ‘tool room copy’ examples routinely being on circuit, because the cockpit environment destroys any camera you affix inside.
There was some early promise, the 512S winning the Sebring 12 Hours in March, but only because all of the works 917s hit trouble. It never claimed another victory, as Porsches of one form or another won every remaining event in the championship that year. The best 512 came home in fourth place at the Le Mans 24 Hours, which may not sound too terrible until you consider it was 30 laps down on the winning 917. That equates to a little more than 400 miles…
"Ferrari proved unequivocally that it finally had the measure of the 917. So what did it do? It retired the car from competition"
The 512S, gorgeous though it was, was clearly not up to scratch on the track, so it seemed only logical that an updated ‘Modificata’ was required. This Ferrari had a lighter construction, reworked aerodynamic package and better brakes to give it a nimbler feel and more performance. And it worked. At the last race of the championship, the prototype 512M led the factory Porsches with ease until its alternator failed. Then, finally, at the non-championship Kyalami Nine Hours season closer, one factory 512M met one factory Porsche 917, took pole, fastest lap and won by an entire lap, despite having to recover a one minute penalty for jumping the start. In a straight fight, over an extended distance on an even playing field, Ferrari proved unequivocally that it finally had the measure of the 917. So what did it do? It retired the car from competition.
The thinking was motivated by a desire never to be caught napping by a new set of rules again. For 1971, the last year before maximum prototype engine capacity was reduced from five to three litres, Ferrari would perfect its 3-litre car in preparation for an all-out assault on the title in 1972. It worked. With the 917 rendered similarly obsolete, Ferrari’s 312PB entered 10 rounds of an 11-round championship and won every one of them. As for the 512M, it was left to privateer race teams to campaign, which never stood a chance next to the mighty Porsche and its JW Automotive and Martini factory teams. How it might have fared with full Maranello backing is another of motor racing’s tantalising ‘if only’ stories.
“Given this 36-year-old author’s prematurely rose-tinted approach to motorsport, it is quite literally perfect. But none of that explains why I think it's the greatest car you can race today”
It looks like a winner, though, doesn’t it? The nose skimming the floor, lines of the bodywork darting angularly towards the upward-inclined tabs in a style cribbed delightfully by the new 849 Testarossa. Bulbous front arches hug the front tyres, which smear like paint around an inset front wheel design.
Very fast, very loud, very analogue: a perfect example of another time. This stillborn prince of Ferrari’s Le Mans lineage, without results, feels like a selfless gift into the future. Given this 36-year-old author’s prematurely rose-tinted approach to motorsport, it is quite literally perfect. But none of that explains why I think it’s the greatest car you can race today.
The reason I think this is ‘peak race car’ is a combination of time and place. The Italian way to greatness appears to be understanding the complexity and talent required to turn apparently simple things into masterpieces. So, it is with this Ferrari. A simplistic endurance racing formula, perfected and balanced.
The 512M didn't prioritise aerodynamics over driver feedback
The driving position encapsulates both engagement and visibility. Just far enough in to feel like a part of the car, but the ample bubble screen and limited structure to the A-pillars give the impression of floating directly through the air to the next corner.
The steering has weight and a sense of connection with the road surface, but is not heavy. The initial 10 degrees of the rack are direct and alert, achieving a geometrically predictable response that manufacturers will try to emulate with software trickery in power-assisted steering systems years later.
In the mid-corner, the steering communicates in a way that ’90s Group C cars cannot manage. Lacking real downforce and therefore any requirement for the stiffness to go with it, this might cost efficiency, but it opens the door to optimising driver feel.
The 512M is in a group of cars where the feeling in the palms of ‘the nut behind the wheel’ was still of most importance. Start adding splitters and wings and suddenly your front suspension setup is no longer ‘yours’ because it belongs to the airflow and the magical extra grip that downforce can bring. We are not there yet with the 512M; it’s still all about the driver, feeling it in.
Having enough rear tyre grip to put down 600bhp dominates the car’s handling, with a general understeer that comes with the weight balance of a mid-engined prototype with a heavy engine block –and in a car with an all-up weight of little more than 800kg. However, unlike other racers of the era, which can plough on unapologetically from mid-corner to exit, the Ferrari’s front end is continuously attempting to grip, while its steering communicates exactly the moment when the car is ready to go again.
The travel of all three pedals is just right; the clutch engages early but releases smoothly. Depressing the brake pedal feels just deep enough to sense the movement of the fluids in the system and feel the pressure accurately. You talk to the brakes and they talk back. The throttle depth and linearity of feel evoke confidence in the application, but are not so deep as to cost synchronicity on the upshift.
But while the Ferrari is light, why not then drive the even lighter victor? If the 512 is the ultimate race car, surely the 917 beats it as ‘ultimate race car plus’. The answer lies in how the two have transitioned to modern circuits. Famously pressurised to reveal cracks, the 917 chassis was on the very limit of structural integrity even for the loads of the era in which it raced. Firstly, the fear of hurting yourself in a 917 was and remains so intense that even drivers of the era, with whom I have discussed it, recount negotiating for seats in slower models with the aim of self-preservation.
"Like a maître d' at the best restaurant in the città, it seamlessly handles an immense weight of the ‘back of house’ workload, while simultaneously presenting a relaxed and polished front to the customer"
Mechanically, modern loads, tyres and circuits anecdotally reduce the experience of driving a ‘real’ 917 into a preservation parade. Despite being ‘the one’ back in the day, this is a car that was so on the structural limit it is impossible to race competitively now. The Ferrari’s construction was notably different. Although both were nominally based around a spaceframe, Porsche used predominantly aluminium alloy tubing, while Ferrari stayed with stronger but heavier steel tubes. Additionally, while the spaceframe was all you got in the Porsche, the Ferrari chassis was braced by aluminium sheeting in crucial areas between the tubes. This led to a chassis possibly twice as heavy as that of its rival, but in a far better position to take additional loadings.
The 512’s other more functional and raceable contemporary rival, the fearsome Lola T70 MkIIIB, is also quite the machine, but it is no Ferrari. The gearshift of the Lola with its torquey (usually Chevy) V8 is swift and dog-engaged, but understandably over-engineered for endurance competition. The eventual selection of the big cogs ricochets back through the linkage every time. Get out of sequence with the natural mesh of the gearbox and you’ll be way behind racing speed in the land of ‘crunch’ without drive or hope. This difference in feel encapsulates the general character of the two machines.
The Ferrari’s gearbox is able to deal with similar torque and monstrous load but somehow does so with refinement. Despite its long, complex linkage, the change is light and swift, without the agricultural feel of the era’s other machinery. Like a maître d’ at the best restaurant in the città, it seamlessly handles an immense weight of the ‘back of house’ workload, while simultaneously presenting a relaxed and polished front to the customer.
Aerodynamics such as they exist in the Ferrari manifest themselves with pleasing high-speed stability. Yet like all Ferraris of the era, the engine is a true masterpiece. Torque is delivered from 2000rpm to 9000rpm in a seemingly flat profile. In any gear, the system attacks the problem with a cacophonous soundtrack. The intensity of noise moves the ‘earplug-friendly zone’ from within the cockpit to within 10 metres of the car in any direction. At full noise, the vibration can be felt in your bones. Ask a child to draw a car, they will colour it red. Ask a child to imitate a race car’s sound; this is the noise they are trying to make.
As for my contemporary experience of the 512M, I raced one against a group of its peers at the Silverstone Festival. Even today, on a wide, modern F1-approved circuit, it dominated the senses like no contemporary race car ever has. I simply cannot imagine a 1971 professional drive, with this as the monster to be tamed at uncompromising Le Mans. What a time it must have been!
Perhaps that’s why I feel such an affinity with the 512M. Neither of us won Le Mans. In both cases, history will read that as the end of the story. Instead, it was merely the point at which a different one began. Mine eventually led me back to the Ferrari, half a century later, trying to understand what its contemporaries already knew. That victory isn’t recorded in any results book, but every lap reminds me that some racing cars are remembered not because they won, but because of how they made people feel. And in that regard at least, the Ferrari 512M is among the greatest of them all.
