One of the only three Ferrari F50 GT1 built is being put through its paces at the Yas Marina circuit

There was a time, in the 1990s, when endurance races were fought by a handful of the hypercars of the moment pushed to the limit and regulated only by the rules the championships set to control such power.

Cars like the McLaren F1 GTR, the Porsche 911 GT1, the Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR… or even more modest brands like Lotus and its Elise GT1 literally put their best engineers to work developing the most brutal machines ever built, whose only goal was to beat all their rivals without mercy.

Along the way, other manufacturers fell by the wayside, seeing how development costs and fierce competition on such demanding tracks as Le Mans, Nürburgring, Spa…

And Ferrari also wanted its share of the spotlight. From the end of the previous decade, it did so with the legendary Ferrari F40 in its Ferrari F40 LM version. After the car went out of production and, with the arrival of its successor, the Ferrari F50, the people in Maranello wanted to keep the project alive to maintain their presence in championships such as the American IMSA or the FIA-sanctioned World Championship. But costs, the absolute need to win in Formula 1, and a lack of confidence in the project ended up leading to its cancellation.

Despite this, by 1996 Ferrari had already built 3 units of the Ferrari F50 GT1, a machine that, thanks to work on its V12 engine, rose from the original 520 CV to 760. A car that, with aerodynamics that, among other things, replaced its removable roof with a rigid one to meet competition requirements, adopted extreme aerodynamic solutions, which catapulted it from 0 to 100 km/h in 3 seconds versus the 4 of the 1995 road version.

Nearly a quarter of a century after this story, one of the only three Ferrari F50 GT1s built has been privately driven at the exotic Yas Marina circuit. A venue built by and for the luxury of Formula 1, where this car can be enjoyed to the fullest.

And, while it is true that the chances of getting to ride, let alone drive, one of these unicorns of the automotive world are slim, thanks to the recording of British driver Jon Lancaster aboard the Ferrari F50 GT1.

With an atrocious roar, the radical character of this car is shown in every move the driver makes. A beast that only a few can tame, but many of us can enjoy, from a distance, thanks to the video below.

https://youtu.be/Or7zwidKrnI