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I was 13 years old when I drove my first ever Lamborghini and I can still remember it. The vehicle belonged to a friend's dad, a farmer down the road. He had just purchased it, brand spanking new, and his son and I ran it across a field chasing a handful of wandering sheep.
By now, you're probably thinking that I've gone completely insane, lost the plot, or that I'm telling you a bunch of pork pies (translation: lies).
However, the story that I have just related is in fact completely and utterly true. The event took place on a farm in the west country of England, back in the early eighties.
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Of course, it was not an exotic sports car to which I was referring, but rather a farm tractor which carries the same logo.
You see, long before the Lamborghini nameplate appeared on exotic sports cars, it was associated rather more with the production of agricultural equipment. Even today, you can still purchase a Lamborghini diesel-powered farm tractor.
In fact, if it hadn't been for the money that Ferruccio Lamborghini (the company founder) made from manufacturing and selling his farm tractors, and various other businesses he owned, the Italian sports car industry would have basically been a one-horse race.
Actually, there's more than a little twist to that last comment, because the reason Ferruccio moved into sports car manufacturing in the first place, was that he dreamt of going head to head with Ferrari.
Although Ferruccio was a wealthy man at the time due to his many businesses, many thought him crazy to risk what he had amassed on such a wild venture as competing with the famous prancing horse brand, but Ferruccio was not a man to be easily deterred.
In 1963, he constructed a purpose-built factory to produce his new line of sports cars. That in itself is quite interesting because he specifically designed the building so that the management offices directly overlooked the factory floor.
From there he oversaw all production, and could often be found with his shirt sleeves rolled up working alongside his workforce when he noticed something amiss down on the shop floor.
Quite the man by all accounts, and I'm truly glad that Ferruccio followed his dream, because if he hadn't, I wouldn't be now standing in the Lamborghini Theatre at the Toronto Auto Show drooling over some of the finest pieces of automotive machinery ever produced.
Let me run through the feast of vehicles on view before me.
On center stage, there sits Lamborghini's fabulous Concept S which is flanked by a Gallardo Superleggera on one side, and a Murciélago LP640 Coupe on the other. All finished in white, really quite stunning!
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