The Ferrari no one wanted to win the F1 title

Throughout the 1960s, Ferrari's focus on Formula 1 slipped as money grew tighter and engineering resources were increasingly directed towards sportscar racing and Le Mans. This was, after all, a fertile ground for selling cars to customers and a rare European playground for American interests. Enzo had famously come close to selling out to Ford before ultimately reaching terms with the Fiat empire to sell a 40% share of his business.

The upshot was that Ferrari's first car for the three-litre era, the 312, was overweight and underpowered, having inherited its engine from a sportscar. Frustrated by both this and the annual failure to get any meaningful F1 development work done until after Le Mans, John Surtees left after a bust-up with the team in 1966. Successive iterations of the 312 failed to deliver the goods on track as the powerful, flexible Ford-bankrolled Cosworth V8 became ubiquitous.

The 312 (three litres, 12 cylinders) designation served Ferrari for 14 years and covered many cars, including four carrying the B designation (one of which would never race). During the service life of the B models, Ferrari's very commitment to F1 would come under threat.

1969 proved to be a pivotal year as Fiat bought in and work began on an all-new engine to replace the V12, which soldiered on in a greatly revised form that finally achieved competitive power outputs - but at the cost of prodigious thirst and unreliability.

It was a one-car entry for most of the season and failures cost lead driver Chris Amon several decent results. When Ferrari skipped the 1969 German Grand Prix rather than face further humiliation and Mauro Forghieri's new flat-12 engine showed a similar appetite for self-destruction in early testing - scuppering plans to introduce the 312B at Monza - the frustrated Amon also walked, having only reached the checkered flag once all season.

Once its development problems had been expunged, the flat-12 would go on to support Ferrari's F1 programme throughout the 1970s. Essentially a flattened out V12 rather than a classic 'boxer' (in which the opposed cylinders are always travelling in the same direction), the new engine was both lighter than the old lump and offered a lower centre of gravity.

Between the 312B's teething troubles and Ickx's injuries, Ferrari didn't win a race until August, by which time Lotus had sorted the wayward 72 and Rindt had begun a winning streak that would result in the world championship

In trying to minimise the internal frictional losses - naturally greater in a 12-cylinder engine than an eight-pot - Forghieri sought to get away with just four main bearings and it was these, along with crankshaft vibrations and oil starvation, that were the source of the initial blow-ups.

A change of bearing type, and a one-piece machined crankshaft with rubber cushions at the flywheel end, cured many of the issues and Fiat investment provided a new tilting dyno, which helped with taming oil surge.

Ferrari still lacked the necessary funds and expertise to build a monocoque chassis, so the 312B followed Forghieri's practice of embellishing a spaceframe structure with alloy panels to form a semi-monocoque.

The result was a beefier-looking car than the new Lotus 72 - which went on to dominate the season but was plagued by chassis flex and handling issues at first. Indeed, the 312B had more in common with the Lotus 49 in terms of its tight packaging, hardly a surprise since the 49 was the definitive 'cigar tube' design before F1 convention shifted to wedgier shapes.

Rocker arms at the front kept the springs and dampers out of the airflow and Forghieri kept the nose (and air intake for the front-mounted radiator) wide and slim, with a pair of fixed aerofoils on either side.

Though the engine block was theoretically strong enough to act as a stressed member of the chassis, as with the DFV, in the 312B it was buttressed by a horizontal pylon that ran over the top of the crankcase, and served as a mount for the rear wing. This enabled the wing to be both lower and further forward than on the majority of Ferrari's rivals, on the rear axle line.

Ferrari began the 1970 season cautiously with a single-car entry for the returning Jacky Ickx, who gave the 312B its debut in the South African GP at Kyalami in March. Ickx qualified second but rode a kerb too heavily in the race, causing an oil leak that made his engine seize. Lotus had temporarily shelved its 72 in favour of the 49 but pre-season favourite Jochen Rindt also retired, and Jack Brabham ran clear to claim what would be his final F1 victory.

Ickx could only manage seventh on the grid for the next round at Jarama, but was taken out on the first lap when Jackie Oliver's BRM suffered a brake failure and hit the Ferrari hard enough to puncture its fuel tank. Ickx suffered burns of both the fire and chemical variety, having been doused in petrol before escaping the cockpit, and both cars were destroyed in a blaze that took an hour to control - while the race carried on...

Between the 312B's teething troubles and Ickx's injuries, Ferrari didn't win a race until August, by which time Lotus had sorted the wayward 72 and Rindt had begun a winning streak that would enable him to take his place in the history books as F1's first posthumous champion, after his fatal accident at Monza.

The superiority of the new Lotus over the Ferrari was writ large when Rindt outbraked Ickx and went round the outside at the hairpin in the Dutch Grand Prix to claim the lead, three laps in.

Joined by Clay Regazzoni and Ignazio Giunti for the second half of the season, Ickx took advantage of modifications to the 312B - including a flatter rear wing, better brakes and beefed-up front suspension - to win three races.

But he fell five points short of Rindt's total, and it is to Ickx's great credit that he maintains to this day that the best man won: "How could you beat someone who is not able to defend himself?"

RACE RECORD (1970-71)
Starts 35
Wins 5
Poles 6
Fastest laps 10
Other podiums 7
Points 92

SPECIFICATION
Chassis Spaceframe/aluminium-panel 
semi-monocoque
Suspension Rocker arms, coil springs and telescopic dampers (f), Double wishbones, 
coil springs and telescopic dampers (r)
Engine Ferrari 001 flat-12
Engine capacity 2998cc
Power 460bhp @ 11,500 rpm
Gearbox Five-speed manual
Tyres Firestone and Goodyear
Weight 583kg
Notable drivers Jacky Ickx, Clay Regazzoni, Ignazio Giunti, Mario Andretti