1972 Alfa Romeo Tipo 33 TT 3

For Sale by Girardo & Co.

Photo – Girardo & Co.

The World Sportscar Championship was a serious place to be in the 1970s. Some of the most legendary race cars of all time came out of manufacturer desperation to win in this series. Its golden era was roughly between 1966 and 1981, when Group C appeared and everything changed.

So it’s no wonder that Alfa Romeo’s “33” line of endurance racing prototypes was updated fairly frequently between 1966 and 1977. The Tipo 33/3 was introduced in 1967, and by 1969 they realized they could do better. They entered the Tipo 33 TT 3 beginning in 1971.

Differences included a steel space-frame chassis and redesigned cylinder heads for the 3.0-liter V8 that upped output to 440 horsepower (at a shrieking 9,800 rpm). This car was a factory Autodelta racer, and it’s competition history includes:

1972 24 Hours of Le Mans – 4th (with Andrea de Adamich and Nino Vaccarella)

The car was sold in 1974 to a privateer and later passed through a number of collections. It raced at the Le Mans Classic in 2012 and was last on track there in 2018. Alfa shifted to 12-cylinders after this, making the 33 TT 3 the last great V8-powered Alfa prototype racer. It can now be yours, and more info is available here.

1974 Alfa Romeo Tipo 33 TT 12

Offered by Gooding & Company | Pebble Beach, California | August 18, 2017

Photo – Gooding & Company

The Alfa Romeo Tipo 33 was a series of awesome prototype racing cars built by Alfa between 1966 and 1977. We’ve previously featured the Tipo 33/2 and 33/3, which were two of the earlier designs. The TT 12 was the second-to-last version and it was built between 1973 and 1976.

Prior to this car, the Tipo 33s were V-8 powered. For 1973, they opted to install a 3.0-liter flat-12 that puts out 500 horsepower. The “TT” does not stand for “twin turbocharged” but instead references the car’s tubular chassis. This was a factory race car, owned and operated by Autodelta S.p.A. and under their direction, it competed in the following races:

1975 1000km Monza – DNF (with Henri Pescarolo and Derek Bell)
1975 1000km Spa – 1st (with Pescarolo and Bell)
1975 1000km Nurburgring – DNF (with Pescarolo and Bell)
1975 6 Hours of Watkins Glen – 1st (with Pescarolo and Bell)

That’s just a few of the big races it competed in, as it ended up winning at least one more. For 1976, Alfa replaced the 33 TT 12s with the next generation car and this example was parked. In 1980, Autodelta dealt this car to a collector in California who has owned it since. It’s shown up at the Monterey Historics six times over the years and you can take it there next year. Only six of these were built and this one should bring between $2,400,000-$2,800,000. Click here for more info and here for more from this sale.

Update: Not sold.