Ferrari 360 Modena at Horsepower at the House

As I’m sure many of you do, I enjoy car shows. Waking up the morning after you spent an afternoon cleaning, polishing and getting your pride and joy ready to go and share your passion with likeminded people is one of the simplest pleasures in life. Especially so when it’s sunny.

This last Saturday, I had the delight of attending a local meet up, organised by a good friend of mine. Called ‘Horsepower at the House’, it is held at a historic Tudor mansion in Dorset

who opened up their cafe for coffee and pastries, and I spent the morning talking about cars with car people.

A great variety of motors showed up. Italian exotics, German bruisers and little French hatchbacks were all present, and every car provided something a bit different to what was parked next to it.

One of my favourites was this Ferrari 360 Modena. Usually, Ferrari owners like to keep them locked away, covering a tiny amount of miles every year in fear of devaluing their car or damaging it in any way. The example that showed up was the exact opposite of this philosophy. The man who brought this along has owned it for 15 years, in which time it has accumulated 85,000 miles. This might not seem like much, but it is a fair bit for a modern classic Ferrari. Add to that that a lot of those miles were on a variety of the tracks around Europe, and you realise this car has lived a proper life and bears the scars to show. The front bumper is covered in stone chips from hunting down traffic on track days and there are scuffs in most of the panels. I don’t see it as a bad example or in poor condition though, these are just battle scars that have been hard earned, and the owner is proud of them.

To make the standard car more suited to track use, it has a variety of modifications. From what I could see, the 3.6 litre V8 has been treated to a pair of carbon intakes which will dramatically enhance the induction roar and increase performance. To help bring it all to a stop, carbon ceramic brakes hide under the motorsport inspired centrelock wheels.

I love it when people properly use their cars like this. It was designed to be driven hard all the time, so with the right maintenance I don’t see why you shouldn’t. If you’ve got a car like this, get out and appreciate it while you can. Life is too short to drive boring cars.