Every year at the prestigious Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, Polyphony Digital award the Gran Turismo Trophy; a token of intent to bring the chosen winner into the Gran Turismo series. The official description of the trophy states the following:
“The Gran Turismo Trophy, established in 2008, is awarded to the most significant car balancing both artistic beauty and performance at the highest level and most desired for inclusion in the Gran Turismo series.”
Since its inception there have been 8 winners including the beautiful Lamborghini Miura and the Alfa Romeo Giulia TZ2, which have both featured in Gran Turismo in the past. This year, on the 66th iteration of the event, the trophy has been awarded to the breathtaking 1966 Ferrari 330 P4 Drogo Spyder.
The car itself may seem from the off-set very similar to the Ferrari 330 P4 Race Car that featured in GT5/6. This version of the legendary racer precedes it by a year however, with the in-game version being from 1967. What makes the 1966 car so special though, is that it is the original P4 in the purest of forms: the car that featured in previous GT’s actually had a few different guises, whereas the 2016 winner shown above is the car in it’s truest, raw form. You can see the car being awarded the trophy in the live-stream below (the video will start at the exact time the trophy was given out).
Interestingly, Kazunori Yamauchi was not present to hand over the award despite doing so for every other winning vehicle. Takuya Asano (director of the ‘Gran Turismo Explore Studio’) instead had the honours, presenting the prize to the owner of the wonderful vehicle. In the driver’s seat, Sir Jackie Stewart shows off the beautiful noise the Italian-born car is capable of. One thing is for sure, we hope GT’s new sound engine manages to capture her in all her beauty if included in a future Gran Turismo iteration!
Thanks to MotorTrend for the live-stream above.
See more articles on Gran Turismo Trophy and Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.
I feel awful for the winners of this award. Hopefully the outright rewards of owning/driving/enjoying the beautiful vehicle that they have created is satisfying enough, because that car ain’t gonna be in any video game for a while!
Polyphony Digital. Astounding dedicated fans in the wrong ways for 10 years now! Lol.
Is it a stunning looking car? Hell yeah.
Did it need to be in GT since we already have the almost exact same car in the game? Hell no.
Part of the $20 mil. club! One of my most favorite cars to drive in GT… Not many racecars get the description of “elegant”, but this is… I hope they bring back all the classic Le Mans cars!
Just imagine the GR.1 class now if this were to be included.
– A few 2009-11 LMP1s
– A few cars from Wipeout HD
– A Ferrari from 1966
I’d still go for the Ferrari
Hopefully that will lock in a spot in GTS. Sexy
I’m struggling to find out about this car. I know Wiki is hardly the definitive source, but as far as they’re concerned the 330 P4 is a 1967 car (of which they made 4).
1966 they made the P3, of which there were 3, and none remain, #0846 was converted to a P4 (could that be this car?) and the other 2 were converter to a 412P (apparently)
The only mention of Pierre Drogo modifying bodywork is on earlier P2 cars, but I’m sure that’s just Wiki lacking.
Either way, I’m sorry but the difference between this and the 330 P4 we’ve had since GT5 is negligible in computer game terms. I look forward to a Jag XJ13 winning the GT award next year…
Ah OK, I actually just carried on reading and looked at the pictures… It’s car 0856. So just another P4… From 1967… Which is the same as the car we have…
I don’t understand how they’ve stuck a ’66 on it, but either way, it’s the car we already have.
0856 was actually the first 330 P4 built by Ferrari and I believe that this was the test car that Ferrari used to conduct 560 test-laps around Daytona in 1966. So yes, it was actually built in 1966 for the 1967 championship season.
0856 is the sole remaining untouched 330 P4 as intended from the factory, the other one was modified with a Can-Am engine and altered bodywork. There was a third which was built by a privateer using spare parts, and although Ferrari did give him a chassis number, I don’t consider it to be a factory car.
I think Kaz fell in love with 0856 because it was the first time it had been seen in public for about 12 years.
http://talacrest.com/ferrari330p4/ 0858 we have in GT was wearing its 350 CanAm Spyder bodywork from 1967-2011, so when it was modelled for GT around 2009 they didn’t model the real car as it was. Unless they modelled 0858 with CanAm engine/chassis, this will be the exact same.
That’s my car.
It is a stunning looking machine and I look forward to trying it in Gran Turismo in about 2022.
What a wonderful noise this beast makes too.
No matter how you look at it, it’s still basically the same car as the one in GT5/6.
inb4 the car is not included in the next game.
It’s been in GT5 and 6 already actually xD
Since it’s a race car it might be in GTS? Who knows…
submaniac93, it is already stated in the article that this version is a year older than the one in Gran Turismo:
“The car itself may seem from the off-set very similar to the Ferrari 330 P4 Race Car that featured in GT5/6. This version of the legendary racer precedes it by a year however, with the in-game version being from 1967.”
I don’t reckon it’ll be in the new GTSport, since they’re all modern cars. Don’t quote me though..
Damn that’s a sexy car..