Gordini Simca 5

About this model

It is thanks to the immense talent of Dante Giacosa that Italy owes the creation of the Fiat 500, priced inexpensively by the head of Fiat, co-owner Gianni Agnelli, so as to be affordable to the very workers who produced it. This topolino (baby mouse) was such a major success it was renamed the Simca 5 and exported to France by Simca. It was then that Amédée Gordini, nicknamed the 'Wizard' for his technical genius with large-scale mechanical bases (Fiat then Simca), used it to develop the race version Simca 5.

The car was equipped with the smallest engine ever entered in the 24 Hours of Le Mans (568 cm3). With a top speed of 110 kph, it clocked an average 85 kph (compared to the average 92 kph of the winning Chenard & Walcker in 1923) and won its class three years in a row (1937, 1938 and 1939), including the win index performance in 1938.