The beautiful, clean, futuristic lines of the Countach were styled by Marcello Gandini, Design Director of Carrozzeria Bertone.
Countach LP 500 was featured in all the international automotive magazines for the time. (Photo: SNS)
Exactly 50 years ago, Lamborghini launched its Countach LP 500 in yellow colour, at the Geneva Motor Show. Its unveiling was so successful that the company raced against time to satisfy the customers’ requests and transform the futuristic show car into a production car, though in a small series.
The beautiful, clean, futuristic lines of the Countach, still so after 50 years, were styled by Marcello Gandini, Design Director of Carrozzeria Bertone. He was also responsible for the decision to use the scissor doors, which thill the date stamps as the futuristic design in the world of automobiles.
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Following the success of LP 500 in Geneva, Lamborghini’s chief test driver Bob Wallace used the car, equipped with a more reliable 4-liter engine, for every possible kind of road test. The career of this extraordinary car ended at the beginning of 1974, when it was used for the crash tests required for the homologation of the production car and subsequently scrapped.
From 1974 to 1990, 1,999 Countachs in five different series were produced, representing a model that, in addition to ending up displayed on the bedroom walls of an entire generation and is used in dozens of films, allowed Lamborghini to survive the most difficult years of its history and to enter permanently into the halls of legend. Lamborghini especially noted that during its peak years, the Countach LP 500 was featured in all the international automotive magazines for the time.
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