Derek Bell

His name is inextricably linked with one marque, and it isn’t Ferrari. Derek Bell MBE is a Porsche man. Everyone knows that. Four of his five victories in the 24 Heures du Mans were racked up with the works team, after all. The thing is, the man himself sees it differently. Bell made his Grand Prix debut driving a red car from Maranello. His maiden start in a sports-prototype was also aboard a Ferrari. Throw in ownership of a 275GTB/4, Daytona and more recent fare and it is abundantly clear that he’s a hardcore Ferrari fan. 

Now in his eighth decade, and still competing as and when the mood takes him, this racing silverback was relatively late to the party. He was 23 when he first ventured trackside in March 1964, winning first time out in a Lotus Seven shared with lifelong friend John Penfold. In late ’65, he made the leap to Formula Three and became a frontrunner. The die was cast. “After that first race at Goodwood, I spent the rest of the 1960s pursuing my goal of becoming a Grand Prix driver,” he says. 

“In those days, the ladder to racing glory was clearly delineated. Finance, talent, and luck permitting, F3 led to F2 and then a seat at the top table. I joined Scuderia Ferrari midway through 1968, having gone quite well in F2 with my own Brabham during the first half of the season. I finished third at the Nürburgring behind Chris Irwin and Kurt Ahrens in April of that year and, soon after the race, I received a call from Shell’s representative, Keith Ballisat. He told me a test was in the offing. Ferrari was running an F2 programme with the Dino 166, the idea being that I would test the car brought over to the UK for Jacky Ickx to drive at the Whit Monday meeting at Crystal Palace. Unfortunately, Jacky crashed it, so I would test the car at Monza instead.

“When I got to the circuit, there were perhaps a dozen drivers on hand waiting to have a go. I was quicker than all of them and a day later I was shown around the factory in Maranello. It was like the Marie Celeste. I was informed by one of Enzo Ferrari’s secretaries – a man, because he didn’t like having women in the race shop – that this was because it was a national holiday. It later transpired that the workers were on strike. During my second lap of the factory, this elegant, silver-haired man walked towards us between a row of cars. He wore dark glasses and had a white raincoat draped over his shoulders. Walking alongside him was a guy who couldn’t have been more than five feet tall. The secretary pointed out that “Il Commendatore” was the one on the left, as if I hadn’t figured that out for myself. We then had lunch at the Cavallino restaurant, just over the road from the factory gates.”

Barely four years into his career, Bell was breaking bread with a legendary career-maker – and breaker. A drive was in the offing. “I must have made an impression because I was invited back for another test with a view to taking part in the Monza Lottery at the end of June. I then learned that the seat was mine. It all went swimmingly to begin with. I started from pole, but then the car swapped ends exiting the Parabolica which triggered an almighty shunt. The net result was three bent Dinos. I had been offered a contract before the race but had decided to wait until I’d had time to mull things over. Now I was kicking myself. However, a few days later, I received a telegram inviting me to return to Maranello to sign to race in F2. What’s more, there would be a $1000 bonus because Mr Ferrari had been impressed with my efforts securing pole at Monza!”

Following several strong showings, Bell was handed a promotion – sort of. “I was invited to make my first-ever World Championship Formula One start at Monza, having already raced a 312 F1 in the non-points Oulton Park Gold Cup earlier in the season. I would drive in the 1968 Italian Grand Prix. I was annoyed to qualify only eighth, although, to be honest, that wasn’t that bad an effort. It’s just that my team-mates, Ickx and Chris Amon, were third and fourth respectively. In the race itself, I was running in seventh place, only to drop out on the fourth lap thanks to a damaged piston. I also drove in the US Grand Prix at Watkins Glen, but again retired with engine failure.”

Bell and Amon developed a great friendship, one that lasted more than half a century. “When I was racing in Formula 3 and Formula 2, I drove in single-car teams. I never had a team-mate until I joined Ferrari in June 1968,” he muses. “Jacky and Chris were the team leaders, but Jacky mostly returned to Belgium between races whereas Chris virtually lived at the factory. As such, he did the bulk of testing. I learned so much from him, it isn’t true. He was a lovely, uncomplicated bloke who led by example. We raced together in the Tasman series in early ’69 driving the little Dino 246Ts. That was a wonderful experience. We stayed at his parent’s place in New Zealand which was delightfully informal. Between races, there would be barbeques in the back garden, with Jochen Rindt, Piers Courage and the two Franks – Williams and Gardner – joining in the fun. On track, we fought tooth and nail, but we were good friends away from it.”

Unfortunately, Bell’s 1969 programme ended prematurely. There would be no further Grand Prix outings. “My time in F2 with Ferrari ended following my fifth-place finish in the June ’69 Monza Lottery race. I had hoped that I might find my way back into the F1 line-up, but the team was in disarray. I had signed to drive for the most glamorous team in motor sport but had nothing to race. I was released from my contract.”

While the single-seater dream may have soured, Bell went on to enjoy stellar success in sports cars. The irony is that he never wanted to race with a roof over his head and had no interest in competing at Le Mans prior to his maiden outing. “Before my first run there in 1970 with the factory Ferrari 512M, all I knew about the 24 Hours had been gleaned from following the exploits of Stirling Moss and the like on my little portable radio in bed at night while at boarding school. Even after I began racing, all I thought about was a career in Formula One. I never ‘looked over the fence’ as it were.”

His first outing in the 24 Hours almost poisoned him against the endurance classic. “I shared the Ferrari with Ronnie Peterson. Like me, he had never competed there before. To be honest, I didn’t want to drive for the Scuderia. I was peeved at how my programme had ended a year earlier, but I was persuaded to do it. Ronnie and I weren’t given anything by way of instruction and were basically left to run our own race. As it happens, a holed piston ended play three hours in. 

“My abiding memory of that event is what happed just before we retired. I was coming up to pass Reine Wissell in the Filipinetti Ferrari on the approach to Maison Blanche and, as I came through the left-hander, I found Reine in the middle of the road going a lot slower than expected. By that, I mean 140mph rather than 180. As I came up to pass him, he began to edge me towards the apex on the left. I had to get on the grass between the kerbing and the Armco to squeeze through. As I exited the corner, I looked in my mirrors to see all hell breaking loose. Clay Regazzoni had tried to drive his Ferrari around the outside of Reine but was now slewing sideways down the track. The car’s nose then connected with the guardrail with sparks fountaining upwards as it continued its merry way along the barriers. That was my first taste of a race that came to define my career.” 

Bell would make only one more start in the 24 Heures du Mans aboard a Ferrari. What’s more, it wasn’t a sport-prototype. “I was driving for the JW Gulf team in major endurance events during the 1972 season, and that year we had the Cosworth DFV-powered Mirages. They sat out Le Mans in the belief that the cars’ V8s wouldn’t go the distance. I was at a loose end until my old mate Jacques Swaters offered me a drive in his Ecurie Francorchamps Group 4 Ferrari. I had driven Jacques’ 512M in the ’70 Spa 1000km race which was my first major sports car outing. Anyway, for Le Mans I would share a bright yellow Daytona with Teddy Pilette and Richard Bond. 

“We were lying inside the top ten towards the end of the race, fourth in class, when I was collared by a particularly animated Ferrari man. He pushed me up against some tyres and told me not to challenge Mike Parkes who was running third in class in another Daytona. Up to this point, our car had been handling like a wayward shopping trolley, but it began to rain in the closing stages. I decided to go for it. I got my head down and was on Parkes’ tail on the final lap. Going down the Mulsanne straight, I figured I could slipstream past him and out-brake him into the tight corner at the end, even though my car was wallowing all over the place. I thought I had it all worked out. However, I was baulked by a slower car going through the kink. What really did for me, though, were the marshals who were on the track waving their flags to celebrate the winner while the rest of us hadn’t completed the lap. It was only later that the mechanics found that the rear anti-roll bar had been broken for much of the race. That explained why it handled so appallingly.”

It marked his final outing in a Ferrari until great mate Gianpiero Moretti offered him a drive in the 1997 Daytona 24 Hours aboard his Momo-liveried 333SP. “That was the best sports-prototype I ever raced. I drove alongside Gianpiero, Didier Theys and Antonio Hermann. We led for six hours before an electrical fire ended hobbled us in the wee small hours on the Sunday morning. We made it to the flag, though, and ended up seventh. I would love to have raced that car again, but the opportunity never presented itself. I have driven Ferraris in historics since then, including 250GT SWB, 250GTO and Harry Leventis’ fabulous 330LMB. I still hold the marque in such high esteem. I am so grateful to have been a works man. I remember Ken Tyrrell telling me that signing for Ferrari was a mistake; that it would end my career. It didn’t end as I had hoped, that I will admit, but I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

 This article originally appeared in Enzo magazine.

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