There is a mystique that Ferrari cars have always had, ever since the very first Ferrari badged machine rolled out of the workshops in 1947, and that mystique has grown over the years so that today, there is a veritable feeding frenzy to buy just about every Ferrari model ever made. The Ferrari 250 GTO, that first saw the light of day in 1962, has gone down in motorsport history as one of the most exciting cars ever to compete. Only rarely, since that introduction, has Ferrari chosen to allocate those precious, sacred letters to another car from another era.

The 1985 GTO was designed at Pininfarina by Leonardo Fioravanti and built in Scaglietti’s workshops. It’s come to be known as the 288 GTO, even though it left the factory as just a plain GTO.

Its DNA really goes way back into the 1960s when the Dino 206 aluminum bodied streetcar begat the 2.4 litre Dino 246, steel bodied car and when more power was required, that was replaced by the 3 litre V8 engines, the 308. The final iteration of this series was the Ferrari 328, with a 3.2 litre engine, replete with four valve heads, fuel injection and all had transverse engines.

The 288 GTO was specifically designed for group B racing. Group B cars, with engines limited to four litres or the turbocharged equivalent, 1.4 times smaller, had already proven themselves as winners in the WRC, and therefore lent themselves very easily to a racing series. Boost was to be unlimited and exotic materials encouraged.

The group B racing series never got off the ground, so the bulk of the production of these 288 GTOs was destined for use on the road. Ferrari did make 5 Evolutione versions of this car that only weighed 2,000 pounds, that’s 550 pounds lighter than the road going version. With 650 horsepower and a top speed of 225 miles an hour, that must be an absolute beast.

To homologate the 288 GTO, Ferrari had to build at least 200 examples, so that’s the number they made, no more, no less. The big turbocharged V8 is nicely tucked away in the middle of the car, mounted to a 5-speed manual gearbox, and the all-important intercoolers, neatly packaged on either side of the engine block. The GTO has an exceptional balance to weight ratio.

All of this gives the GTO a wheelbase which is 4 inches longer than the 308, a car which the 288 resembles greatly. Fioravanti needed to bulk up the wheel arches and wings to accommodate the much larger wheels. There’s also a nod to the original GTO, he put in some tasty touches like the lip spoiler, the megaphone exhausts, and the three iconic vents in the rear wings, ostensibly to cool the brakes, just like the original GTO used.

This, in many ways really is the ultimate grown-up dino, because it is still a smallish car, and with its 400 odd horsepower, you can still chuck it around.

The 288 GTO was the first production car to go through the 300 Kmph barrier. It has a top speed of 305 Mph and weighs in at 2550Lbs, that’s 500 Lbs lighter than a Ferrari 308. With fiberglass aluminum, Kevlar, and carbon fibre in abundance, it’s hardly surprising it was going to make, without any doubt, one of the greatest and most desirable creations from the Maranello factory.

The GTO was the very last supercar that Ferrari made before Enzo passed away (the F40 had been approved by him but not yet built), at the age of 90, and that reason alone makes this car very special and sought-after today.