There are race cars, and then there are championship-winning race cars.
RM Sotheby’s will auction off the Ferrari F2001 that Michael Schumacher used to clinch the 2001 Formula 1 World Championship before next month’s Monaco Grand Prix. And, if for some reason that wasn’t enticing enough, this race car actually still runs.
Monaco is a fitting place for this vehicle to hit the auction block. Schumacher drove the car, chassis no. 211, to victory in the principality’s grand prix during the 2021 season, the only time he won the storied race during his 11 years with Ferrari. That wasn’t the only race he’d win in the car, though. He also was in the driver’s seat when he took the checkered flag at that season’s Hungarian Grand Prix. That race clinched Schumacher the 2001 drivers’s championship and Ferrari the constructors’s championship, which was the first back-to-back title in the team’s history. Add that all together and you have yourself one of the more important race cars of all time.
The pictures accompanying the auction listing show chassis no. 211 to look nearly identical to how it appeared when it was racing back in 2001. The open-wheel racer wears a red-and-white livery covered in colorful sponsor decals, the most prominent of which, Shell’s “Pecten” logo, can be seen on the nose, sides, and rear spoiler endplates.
A big reason why the race car looks so good is because Ferrari itself has spent the last two years completely overhauling the car and its naturally aspirated 3.0-liter Tipo 050 V-10. Due to that work, the car is drivable 24 years after its time in the spotlight. If the winner of the auction is brave enough they can even race the car in Ferrari’s next Corse Client event with the full support of Maranello.
