Visitors to the Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum get to see amazing cars on display, but also in action and hear them growl, even in nasty weather.
With one of the world's greatest collections of racing sports cars and the theme 'The Spirit of Competition', the Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum truly does celebrate the history of racing. Among the museum's 65-plus strong collection of cars, you’ll find historically significant racers from Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Bugatti, Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar, Bentley, Porsche, Aston Martin, Ford, and of course Chevrolet.
Although this incredible collection of race cars has not seen a track for some time, they were all meant to be driven and to celebrate that the museum hosts a multitude of events including their infamous Demo Days which offer museum goers the opportunity to hear and see some of histories most famous race cars in action.
The ninth edition of this event, held in April 2016, coincided with a freak snowstorm. Attendees didn’t think they would get to see the featured cars run. But, much to their surprise, Dr. Simeone decided to take two of the featured cars out in the less than perfect weather: A beautiful 1966 Corvette 427 Roadster and an original 1963 Corvette Grand Sport. Besides the general shape of the ’66 427 Roadster being the same as the ’63 Grand Sport, the door handles are about all the two cars have in common.
In 1963, Only five Grand Sports were made and by 1964 they were ordered to be destroyed by senior members of General Motors. Chassis numbers #003, #004, and #005 were quickly transferred to private racers, while #001 and #002 were hidden at Chevrolet for two more years and then sold to Roger Penske in 1966.
After #001 was outclassed by the mid-engined Chaparrals and Ford GT40s at Sebring, Penske sold #002 to George Wintersteen, who campaigned it in the 1966 United States Road Racing Championship. It has remained in the condition it ended the season in ever since. The one of five car was last up for sale in 2009 with a price tag of $4.9 million, but instead of selling it was transferred to the museum where it is still on display today and is thought to be worth $10 million.