Ferrari: Courage. The incredible 15,000 miles in a China that didn't yet exist.

On August 29, 2005, exactly twenty years ago, two Ferrari 612 Scagliettis set off from Shanghai, each oddly decorated: one red with a silver nose, the other silver with a red nose. In addition to a few sponsors, they had a large slogan on their hoods and sides: "Ferrari 15,000 Red Miles." Fifteen thousand miles that would take those mighty V12s, imagined for highways or even racetracks, to explore the whole of China, from south to north, from east to west. A very different China from the one we know today: the explosion of modernity was already recognizable in some large cities, Beijing and Shanghai first and foremost, but the railways, highways, and hotel structures were still almost exclusively in the planning phase. Those cars, followed by two service vehicles with spare parts and technicians, a photographer—a truly talented woman—and a cameraman, set off to tour the entire length of China, often without even the road maps of the stretches they were covering. Maps simply didn't exist!

Why that journey, completed without a single accident or breakdown, on October 29th after 61 days? Because of a bold and unique idea by Ferrari: to introduce China to journalists from around the world by driving real Ferraris on every type of road they encountered. Ferrari had just opened its first sales outlet in China, right here in Shanghai. No other manufacturer had begun to consider this vast country a real market. Ferrari did. International journalists didn't know China. No one, really, knew it. How was the journey planned? The two Ferraris would cover approximately 2,000 kilometers each day.