The rain showers which began on Saturday afternoon continued into the early hours as the paddock gathered for the big Finali Mondiali Gala dinner last night ahead of today’s races and Ferrari Show.
It was quite the occasion. The Ferrari Challenge Champions were all recognised on the main stage and Ferrari’s back-to-back Le Mans 24 Hours victories were celebrated by all in attendance.
All six factory Hypercar drivers, plus the senior management team from Ferrari’s endurance programmes, took to the stage with the 2024 Le Mans winning 499P for a photocall and were given a standing ovation.
Later in the night Ferrari’s brand new supercar, the F80, was also shown off too, before the reveal that the 2025 edition of Finali Mondiali will be held at Mugello.
That led us to today. This morning’s track action got underway with the final Ferrari Challenge races, which were held in mixed conditions.
The first race was the Coppa Shell Am Finale Mondiale. Canadian Eric Cheung from Formula Racing was crowned the class ‘World Champion’ after a lights-to-flag win from Pole. It was an impressive drive on the drying track with wet Pirelli tyres, which saw him hold off a late charge from Kessel Racing’s Jan Sandmann.
Next up was the Coppa Shell & 488 Finale Mondiale. This time it would be Kessel that would prevail with Frenchman Henry Hassid, as the #201 488 EVO of Qwin Weitlisbach claimed the 488 class honours.
Unfortunately, a sizeable incident for the #140 296 Challenge from Rosso Scuderia at the Turn 1 kink following a safety car restart with five minutes remaining caused the red flags to make an appearance, bringing the race to a premature end.
Thankfully Andreas Ritzi walked away from the car, which sustained heavy front and rear-end damage and was classified second overall.
The final Finale Mondiale race – for Trofeo Pirelli – was also red-flagged after a shunt at Tamburello, setting up a surprise result.
When the race restarted, pole-sitter Giacomo Altoe from Emil Frey Racing (above) had his hopes of winning the ‘World Championship’ dashed by heavy rain.
As conditions worsened with time expiring, Altoe and the majority of the field dived into the pits to change to wet tyres; it was a gamble that didn’t pay off. The drivers that switched early gained track position, and after a safety car appeared for a car stuck in the gravel with just a few minutes remaining, held on until the finish.
British racer James Owen – driving for Meridien Modena Englstler in the Pirelli Am class – rose from fifth overall to the lead after switching to wet tyres during the red flag, and became the second British driver in two years to win the Trofeo Pirelli Finale Mondiale after Thomas Fleming’s triumph in 2023. Altoe, on the other hand, would drop to sixth overall and third in class.
Before the Ferrari Show later in the afternoon, Alessandra Todeschini, Ferrari’s head of endurance, stopped by the media centre to discuss the highlights of the 296 GT3 programme in 2024 and the forthcoming 2025 racing season.
She reflected on the standout Rolex 24 Hours GTD Pro victory with Risi Competizione back in January and Vista AF Corse’s first FIA WEC LMGT3 win at Fuji.
Todeschini also looked back on the heartbreaking finish to the Spa 24 Hours, when the #51 AF Corse Francorchamps Motors 296 GT3 had a famous Centenary Spa 24 Hours victory slip from its grasp when a Grasser Lamborghini stopped at pit-in, blocking the Ferrari from entering pit lane to take its final stop.
Going forward, she explained that the biggest challenge for the GT3 programme will be to continue deliveries at a pace to track day customers. Almost 150 296 GT3s have been delivered to customers since the car’s debut in 2023 and many more are on the way, she revealed.
“We have just started providing cars to people for track days. We have markets that are really adamant about having this car just for track days. That will be for 2025, then we have to look at an evolution model.”
Ferrari’s plans to produce an EVO update for the 296 GT3 is something which Antonello Coletta, Ferrari’s sportscar boss, also spoke about today.
“We are working on the EVO version of the 296,” Coletta confirmed. “It’s a car that’s new and it was difficult to industrialise it. We have a few details to improve, but we are not talking about change in the next season – in the next two to three years.”
Then came the headline attraction for Sunday – the Ferrari Show – which began the Imola city centre with a road run to the track featuring two of the three 2024 FIA WEC 499Ps, with fans lining the streets for the occasion.
Once at the circuit, they joined the set of cars taking part in the various demo runs in front of the packed grandstands.
The list included the aforementioned Rolex 24 class-winning Risi 296 and AF Corse’s GT3 which finished second in the Spa 24, a number of cars from the F1 Clienti and XX Programme stable, GT cars from the Club Competizioni GT contingent, an F80 and all 10 of the 499P Modificatas on site.
With the Ferrari Show over, attention turned to Antonello Coletta’s press conference which wrapped up this year’s event. He addressed a number of topics about Ferrari’s future at the podium and used it as an opportunity to sum up this year’s Finali Mondiali.
“We had 33,000 people on site, which was really impressive considering the climate,” he said. “It’s always a pleasure to come to this circuit, the local region always helps us hold this unique event.
“Only Ferrari could organise a show like this at a very intense time emotionally, after winning Le Mans twice in two attempts against high-level competition.”
So that’s a wrap for Finali Mondiali in 2024. There’s plenty more content to come on DSC in the days ahead. For now though, with the WEC finale at Bahrain on the horizon, it’s time to sign off.
Missed DSC’s coverage from Friday or Saturday? You can catch up by clicking HERE for Day 1 and HERE for Day 2.
Images courtesy of Ferrari
