Chassis No. ZFFRG36A4R0098159
Engine No. 35566
Transmission No. 551
By the early 1990s, a global recession had slowed sales across the industry, and Ferrari answered with a renewed focus on GT racing. With the 348 having taken over from the much-loved 308/328 line, the factory saw competition as the way to reignite enthusiasm for its road models. Alongside the 348 GT/C built for European competition, Ferrari conceived a single-marque series for its customers, one in which the factory would prepare, maintain, and transport the cars, ensuring equal machinery and allowing drivers to focus solely on competition.
The Challenge series debuted in Europe in 1993 with separate Italian and pan-European championships and a season-ending run-off at Mugello. It proved an immediate success, and factory-prepared 348 Challenge cars were quickly snapped up. Gian Luigi Buitoni, then head of Ferrari North America, wanted American owners included, and he enlisted David Seibert of the Ferrari Club of America to write the regulations and administer the series. After demonstration outings in 1993 at Lime Rock, Savannah, Road Atlanta, and Willow Springs using road-going 348s with safety equipment installed, the North American 348 Challenge began competing in earnest in 1994.
For the formalization of the North American series, Ferrari authorized 45 true 348 Challenge cars, 32 berlinettas and 13 targas, built to the same specification as the European race cars. These carried significant performance gains over the earlier converted examples, including H-specification cylinder heads that raised compression from 10.4:1 to 10.8:1, taller intake plenums for added torque, higher fuel pressure with smaller 88-liter tanks for weight savings, Bosch Motronic 2.7 engine management with a raised rev limiter, and revised cam timing. Altogether, these changes lifted output from 295 to 320 horsepower. Lighter bodywork and racing gearbox ratios completed the package.
The cars also left the factory with ready-made safety provisions that eased later conversion to full race trim, among them pre-threaded floor blocks for the main roll cage, bolt holes for the harnesses, and removable upholstered plates over the roll-hoop brace mounts. Because U.S. import rules and taxes required the cars to be sold and titled as road cars, each was delivered with its safety equipment removed and shipped separately in a large wooden crate, to be reinstalled by the maintaining Ferrari dealer. These cars began the succession of Challenge and Scuderia road-and-racing models that continues today.
Chassis number 98159 is the third-lowest serial number of the 13 factory-authorized U.S.-delivery 348 TS Challenge cars. Although built for racing, it was never fully converted for track use and never competed. It was supplied from the factory with a Challenge kit in a wooden crate, monochromatic rocker panels and chin spoiler, fully adjustable suspension, and the aforementioned safety provisions. The car was gifted to its original owner, who preferred to drive his Bentley and left the Ferrari largely unused, taking it only to the dealer and back for servicing. When its current owner acquired the car in 1998, it showed just 678 miles on the odometer.
The current owner, a member of the Ferrari Club of America for more than 25 years, has retained 98159 for nearly three decades. Under his stewardship, it remained titled in Virginia and was modestly used as a road car, taking part in Ferrari Club tours and concours while seeing repeated service visits to 348 Challenge experts Terry Meeler and Tom Smith, formerly of Foreign Cars Italia in South Carolina, and Scott Lankford at Rosso in Maryland. That long custodianship accounts for the car's exceptional condition today, showing only 22,079 original miles at cataloging, and for the retention of its rare Challenge kit, which remains with the car in its restored factory crate. The kit comprises a bolt-in OMP roll cage (still in its original wrapper), restored OMP embroidered racing seats with brackets, OMP two-inch racing harnesses, an OMP fire suppression bottle, a suede Challenge steering wheel, racing pedals, front and rear brake-cooling kits, underbody trays, a battery relocation kit, high-temperature brake fluid, an electrical kill switch, and Lexan driving-lamp covers.
The car was issued Ferrari Classiche certification in September of 2016, its ''Red Book'' confirming that it retains its original engine, transmission, and factory equipment. Owing to its remarkable mechanical originality and a series of interventions, 98159 has enjoyed a long and successful concours record. The car earned Platinum at the 2000 Cavallino Classic and returned for exhibition in 2002, then underwent a complete exterior restoration by The Karosserie in Philadelphia between 2013 and 2016. In January 2017, it won Best in Class and the Scuderia Cup at Cavallino 26, the competition class's Best of Show award. Freshened again in 2025 with a new Nero interior by White Post Restorations, a major engine-out service by Scott Lankford at Rosso, and comprehensive detailing, it was judged a 100-point Platinum car at the Ferrari Club of America National Meet, where it also took the Coppa Bella Macchina for mechanical excellence.
Adding to its completeness, 98159 is offered with its original books stamped “CHALLENGE,” receipts, tools, Classiche documentation, an original five-piece set of Schedoni luggage, and two keys, the latter bearing the original handwritten factory tag inscribed with the last five digits of the chassis number.
Most surviving Challenge cars carry the marks of their competition use: stripped, caged, raced, and revised over decades of laps. Never fully converted and never campaigned, chassis 98159 remains in a state almost unheard of among these cars. It survives in road trim with only 22,072 miles traveled at the time of cataloging, its factory Challenge equipment untouched, and its accessories intact down to the key tag. The result is a documented Factory Challenge car that reflects the road-going origin of Ferrari's customer racing program, preserved as delivered and usable as the day it left the showroom.
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- VIN CodeZFFRG36A4R0098159
