A PARTING SHOT OF GREATNESS In 1937 the Maserati brothers sold their famous racing concern to the Orsi family, forever changing the trajectory of the storied manufacturer.

But Ernesto Maserati reserved one parting shot for the post-war competition field in the form of a final model he began devising during the war: The A6GCS.

While the first letter honored the late Alfieri Maserati, and the 6 represented the model’s novel inline six-cylinder engine, the G stood for ghisa (Italian for cast iron, indicating the block’s construction material), and the C and S respectively stood for Corsa and Sport.

Although the A6 model most conspicuously took the form of the civilized A6 1500 road car, Ernesto was simultaneously developing the A6GCS racecar.

Engineer Alberto Massimino was charged with building a new tubular steel ladder-type frame that was equipped with a coil-sprung front independent suspension with forged and polished unequal-length A-arms, Houdaille shock absorbers at all corners,...