It started with a simple yet bold request. A purchaser of an early 2000s Ferrari Formula 1 car wanted to experience his machine on track. He understood that the only way to do that was with the help of the team that built it. So the question was popped to then Scuderia Ferrari team principal Jean Todt, who liked the idea and put together a small group of engineers and mechanics to allow the customer to live out his dream. More than 20 years on Maranello has a department stacked with upwards of 50 F1 chassis owned by patrons doing the same.

What is known as F1 Clienti, which formally kicked off in 2003, was born of the unnamed customer’s brazen question. It was followed three years later by the XX programme, which allows customers to own and drive a line of special track-only variants of its fastest road cars, from the Enzo-based FXX through the 599XX the FXX-K developed out of LaFerrari, and evo versions of each. From this year there is something called Sport Prototipi Clienti, which pretty much does what it says on the tin: the 499P Modificata is a version of the Le Mans 24 Hours-winning prototype in which owners can also take to the track in the series of Ferrari-organised events around the globe.

Mr X, or perhaps we should call him Mr XX, wanted to go again after sampling his Ferrari F1. Others heard how he was getting out on track with the help of the factory and wanted to blood their cars as well. Ferrari made it all possible, and it had to if the owners, who for the most part remain anonymous, were to drive their prized possessions. An attempt to run an F1 car laden with electronics from the past 30 years or so without the expertise of the people who produced it would be at best extremely difficult and at worst damaging for the high-value machinery.

“A purchaser of an early 2000s Ferrari Formula 1 car wanted to experience the machine on track”

“Ferrari has been selling F1 cars forever, at least since the 1970s,” says Filippo Petrucci, who is the technical lead of the department running the F1 Clienti, XX and Sport Prototipi cars. “It is possible somehow to run the cars from the ’70s, ’80s and early ’90s, but when you start to have many electronic systems and semi-automatic gearboxes, it becomes difficult. You would need to know the procedures for start-up and the pressure targets for all the systems. If you don’t have this information there could be problems.”

Ferrari has this information, all of it. Need the blueprints for the rear wing of a 1982 126 C2? No problem, fetch it from the archive. That’s not a flippant comment. The rear wing is one of the last items on the job list as one of Harvey Postlethwaite’s first F1 designs for Ferrari is restored by Petrucci’s team. The wing is being manufactured from the original drawings.

It helps that the majority of the staff working on Ferrari’s treasure trove of old F1 cars have come from the F1 team – there is a staff of 60 working across the three strands of the department. Petrucci, for example, joined the Scuderia in 1995, after a stint with the short-lived Forti Corse F1 team, as a design engineer specialising in composites and went on to run the test team before ending up at F1 Clienti in 2015.

Ferrari is uniquely placed to run a programme that allows its old F1 cars to be taken out on track by the most loyal of its customers. It has designed and built both the chassis and engines of all its grand prix machinery throughout its history, with the odd exception in the case of the former. That’s why it is able to run F1 Clienti.

“Until recently there was no Ferrari in 1982 specification  in existence”

More than a dozen F1 cars were out on track when Motor Sport was on-hand to witness the last F1 Clienti event of 2024 at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari at Imola at the end of October. Just as good as the sight of the Scuderia’s finest is the sound. In action all at once were V10-powered cars from the early 2000s, some later V8 cars and then V6 hybrids of the modern era. They are joined at the Finali Mondiali, Ferrari’s annual extravaganza that brings together competitors from its one-make Challenge series around the world, by a sonorous V12-engined 412 T1 from 1994.

It was the oldest F1 on track in Ferrari’s backyard at Imola. The most recent car taking part is a 2017 SF70H, but the Scuderia’s ’18 and ’19 F1 contenders – the SF71H and the SF90 – will be released next year.

There is good reason why newer cars dominate. They are more durable and, most pertinently, engine life – the time between rebuilds – has increased dramatically by regulation in F1. These days each driver, is allowed four power units, comprising the internal combustion engine and the twin hybrid systems. Back in the day, F1 cars would undergo multiple engine changes over the course of a grand prix weekend.

“In those days you had one engine for the Friday, one for Saturday and then one for the race on Sunday,” explains Petrucci. “Engine life is only 300 or 400km [200 to 250 miles or so] when we are talking about the old cars.”

The majority of F1 Clienti cars now can go upwards of 1400km (900 miles) between rebuilds. “With some small tricks, turning down the revs by a few hundred and using some strategies that are a bit softer than the old race strategies, we can preserve the life of the engine,” says Petrucci.

That means an F1 car can complete a full schedule of events. The calendar typically encompasses eight weekends. On the schedule last year were the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi, the Sonoma Raceway in California and the new Balaton Park track in Hungary. This year, a highlight for the F1 owners will be the chance to drive on a shortened version of the Miami International Autodrome three weeks after the grand prix.

For the older cars, “take it easy” is Petrucci’s recommendation. “Maybe you take it to Goodwood [for the Festival of Speed], you come to one of our events and do four or five laps,” he says. “I would not stress too much those old ladies.”

“The software we use is original, but  the laptops  can break”

But there are older cars on the programme. The 126 C2 is a very special one. Until recently there was no Ferrari in 1982 specification in existence. Two of the six chassis were destroyed in the accidents that cost Gilles Villeneuve his life and Didier Pironi his racing career, while two more were written off in testing. The remaining pair were converted into flat-bottom 1983 C2B configuration. The owner, an F1 Clienti regular, sourced a set of ’82 bodywork and then took the car to Maranello for its restoration to be completed. It has already been fired up and will take part in events once finished. The same goes for the 312 T4 in which Jody Scheckter drove in his 1979 title-winning campaign onwards from the Belgian Grand Prix at Zolder, the first of his three victories that year. The car, chassis 040, was part of Scheckter’s personal collection from 1982 and was sold by Sotheby’s in Monaco last summer. It is now a runner again and was driven at Fiorano by its new owner in November.

Keeping a fleet of F1 cars running isn’t without its problems. Petrucci admits that Ferrari is encountering issues with some of its 1990s cars, not because they are proving unreliable but because the laptops required to switch them on are coming to the end of their working lives.

“The software we use is original, but we had one PC in which the hard disc broke,” he explains. “We are following two different solutions: one is to try to find on the market one of those laptops, the other is that one of our suppliers is working on a sort of emulator to run old software on a new PC.”

At the other end of the age range, F1 Clienti has to manage the hybrid technology of the later cars – its first F1 chassis with an energy-retrieval system was the 2009 F60. The batteries need constant maintenance and removing the hybrid element of the power unit would be impossible, says Petrucci. “All the electrical supplies in the car come from the high-voltage battery: without that you can’t even turn on the car because there is no alternator,” he explains. “The car has also not been designed to brake without recharging the electric motors.”

Petrucci’s advice to owners of hybrid machinery is leave them at the factory under F1 Clienti’s supervision, but it is not mandatory. It is a myth that the terms of the sale of its F1 cars obliges the owner to store them with Ferrari.

“The moment you buy the car, it’s yours and you can do with it whatever you want,” he explains. “But it makes sense to leave it here at Maranello if you are in the programme because we take care of everything.”