1980s FERRARI F40 - 201mph

And so we arrive at a notable a benchmark on this journey: the Ferrari F40 was the first production car to exceed the magic 'double-ton'.

You could argue that the F40 owes its existence to healthy opportunism rather than a well-planned marketing strategy. Ferrari's sales had faltered in the early 1980s, with fears that its products were turning 'soft' under Fiat's corporate blanket. A quick solution was needed to turn the tide and, in 1984, Maranello engineer Nicola Materazzi believed that he had one. His plan was to use Group B rallying as a testbed for a more hardcore road product. Approval was given, which resulted in a skunkworks development of what became the 288GTO, with the 288 Evoluzione its competition flag-bearer. Alas, by the time the programme was complete Group B had been dissolved and, while the 288GTO successfully expunged any lingering doubts about Ferrari's softness, there was clearly scope to do more.

Much more, in fact. The F40 replaced the 288GTO in 1987 and, despite the new machine adopting a slightly larger (2936cc versus 2855cc) version of the GTO's twin-turbocharged V8, it was set to be an altogether more high-tech, uncompromising and brutally fast proposition.

Weight reduction and aerodynamics were the F40 development team's watchwords from the start. A clean-sheet design by Leonardo Fioravanti at Pininfarina housed the F40's mighty powerplant in a tubular spaceframe chassis, clothed with bonded Kevlar panels and carbon fibre door skins, bonnet and boot panels.

All but the essentials were stripped from the cabin, leaving ultra-lightweight bucket seats, a pared-down, felt-covered dash and pull-cords for door handles, all contributing to a sylphlike 27231b kerb weight. Wind-tunnel testing resulted in a relatively low (for a sports car) Cd figure of 0.34, and 15,000 miles of testing at Nardò, including 48 hours at a 187mph average, ironed out any high-speed stability issues.