Giotto Bizzarrini - Count Volpi, The Specials and ATS

Count Volpi, The Specials and ATS

In 1961, Bizzarrini was one of the "famous five" engineers who left Ferrari. This is known as the "Ferrari night of the Long Knives" . It was caused because Ferrari wanted to reorganise the engineering staff. Bizzarrini left Ferrari and founded with other ex-Ferrari engineers (Carlo Chiti and others) the company Automobili Turismo e Sport (known as ATS) to build a Formula 1 single seater and a GT sport car, the ATS Serenissima.

In 1962, Bizzarrini was hired by Count Giovanni Volpi, owner of the SSS, Scuderia Serenissima Republica di Venezia, to upgrade a Ferrari 250 GT SWB with chassis number #2819GT to GTO Specification. Ferrari was upset with Volpi and refused to sell him a GTO, so they had to acquire and modify a used vehicle.

Bizzarrini applied all the ideas from the GTO and developed with Piero Drogo of Carrozzeria Sports Cars in the Modena works an aerodynamically advanced body, even lower than the GTO, with the roof line dramatically extended to the rear end, then abruptly truncated following the Kamm aerodynamic theory. The car was completed in just 14 days. The mechanicals were extensively reformed and the engine set well back into the chassis and lowered, using dry-sump lubrication. This car, chassis number #2819GT was called the Ferrari Breadvan, and is currently raced in vintage Sport Car events. The car was raced at the time with some success, with Carlo Abate and other drivers at the wheel, but could not beat the GTOs because it still had only a four-speed gearbox. At least another two 250GT series cars were developed by Bizzarrini, Piero Drogo and teammates Neri and Bonacini to GTO specifications and received distinctive bodies with similar advanced shapes.

In 1962 Bizzarrini founded Società Autostar, an engineering firm through which he would bid for freelance engineering projects.