The Grand Tour

The Grand Tour’s Richard Hammond Reunited With His Old Ferrari 550 Maranello

In an attempt to persuade Richard Hammond to buy back his old Ferrari 550 Maranello, DriveTribe has put him in front of the Italian sports car to reminisce alongside fellow motoring journalist Harry Metcalfe, who also used to own the car.

They meet at Harry’s large filming area for his own YouTube channel, Harry’s Garage, and both Hammond and Harry are taken aback by the car’s beauty, picturing their first days with the car. Quickly, though, Hammond explained the time when he knew he had to sell it when he rolled up to a garage and a mechanic spotted a drop of oil under the car. He explains his emotions for the car as being of “high intensity”.

Harry then explained that he bought the car to be his commute car for use every day – a 70 mile drive each way, to and from his EVO MAgazine HQ in London. In the same way, Hammond explains how he once justified the purchase of a Cavalier SRI because it would put him in a better mood for his work as a radio presenter at the age of 20.

Harry bought the car first with 15,000 miles on the clock at a price of £60,000 in 2004. He owned it until 2007 after putting over 30,000 miles on it and eventually traded it in for a Pagani Zonda. Hammond, knowing that Harry had looked after it, had been in talks about buying the car, but while he was off filming in the North Pole for Top Gear, his wife Mindy purchased the car as a surprise.

Hammond owned it for a few years alongside five other cars while travelling to and from London for work, but in a strange moving scenario between rented houses, he suddenly owed a landlord 6 months of rent, equating to the value of the Ferrari. “I had no choice, it had to go,” he said.

Watch the video above to get the full story.

The auction was the day after the filming of this video, and while Hammond was very tempted, he didn’t end up buying the beautiful car… Or did he?

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