Back in time, when Racers was one of the main themes and Ferrari dominated championships one by one, Lego came out with a series of brilliant and dedicated Ferrari F1 sets, each of them reflecting a specific aspect of the exciting life of a F1 paddock. We had a big truck for transporting, a finish line with podium and pit wall for racing, a pit stop for refueling and many others scenes.

Here we have the 8144-2 Ferrari 248 F1 Team, the second version of the same set. The set was originally launched at the beginning of 2007, a year of transition for Ferrari with Schumacher retiring from competition and being replaced by Raikkonen: if the first version was clearly referred to 2006 season featuring Massa and Schumacher as the two drivers yet, the second featured a 2007 line up with Massa and Raikkonen, definitely a more fresh and up-to-date version for that time. But the only differences here are stickers (mainly updated team logos and livery sponsors) and helmets, because all of the rest is identical.

The box and the pit lane

The whole idea of a racing box scene with crew and all the necessary outfit and spare parts has illustrious predecessors, even if more rudimentary, like the 6395 Victory Lap Raceway, the 6381 Motor Speedway and most of all the 1497 Pitstop Crew; but 8144 is the first ever fully closed racing box released by Lego. The interior of the box is very large, very spacious and the two cars inside surprisingly are not cramped, you can "park" both them inside without sacrificing anything of the internal furniture. The level of details is outstanding: spare tyres, spare front wings, shelves for utensils and even the lollipop, all the most representative scenes and key features of tuning and pit lane life are not missing here, even the quantity of crew minifigs are fair. Maybe I would have also liked a safety chrome helmet and a flexible hose for refueling like the ones seen in the complementary 8673 Fuel Stop set, but it's just a minor complain.

The cars

The F1 cars included in this set, even if they are the same models of the 248 (Vodafone livery) from the original version, here are clearly supposed to be the F2007 (Alice livery). Comparing them to the Ferrari F1 from the first Racers sets they are very similar except mainly for the side-pods sections which are totally different. In fact, while in the previous models those sections look more rounded thanks to the use of 4 curved slope bricks 2 x 2 without studs, the ones used for the models of this set adopt a larger use of plate and tile bricks, so that their final looking is more boxy, more complex. I definitely prefer these types over the previous ones.

Overall opinion

Not so easy to get a new 8144 for a decent price nowadays, and I warmly suggest you to avoid the used ones with stickers in bad or terrible conditions, even if complete. But whatever first or second version - they now are equally outdated for both liveries and drivers - I recommend this set to everyone, it is a very accurate reproduction of a specific moment of F1 life, full of playable features and certainly one of the most refined sets from Racers theme.