The Miura is the ultimate Delegation Special — it exists only because Ferruccio Lamborghini backed off and allowed his team of young, talented engineers and designers to do what they do best.
A finicky mid-engined supercar is the opposite of the Rolls-Royce-like GTs that Ferruccio wanted to build, yet it's the Miura that singlehandedly elevated Lamborghini to the likes of Ferrari.
The four men chiefly behind the car were all in their twenties when the Miura debuted:
Giampaolo Dallara, 29, senior engineer
Paolo Stanzani, 29, assistant engineer
Bob Wallace, 27, chief development engineer
Marcello Gandini, 27, designer
The Miura used the 4-liter Bizzarrini V-12 designed for the 350GT and 400GT, rotated by 90º and mounted transversely in a casting that included the transmission and differential. Power claims were all over the map, but Road & Track's test car banged off a 0-60 in 5.5 seconds, through the quarter-mile in 13.9 sec @ 107.5 mph, and achieved a top speed of 168 mph, making it the fastest car in the world, at the time.
Performance numbers are only a small part of the Miura story. Learn the full backstory here — and see why delegation is so important. To quote Marcello Gandini: "To make exceptional things, you must have complete freedom.”
The proof is in the Miura.
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