While many card collectors may associate the Formula 1 market with modern superfractors of Lewis Hamilton or Max Verstappen, F1 collecting, like the sport itself, has a rich history.
One veteran collector, who asked to remain anonymous, has honed in on vintage and pre-2000 era F1 cards as a possible emerging category. Having been in the hobby for decades, dating back to the first National Sports Collector Convention, he started as a baseball collector.
“I’ve been going to shows for so long … I just see things and go ‘That’s cool,’” he told cllct.
“One of the first F1 cards I bought was a Fangio with a cute little red hat on,” referencing the rookie card of legendary Argentinian racer Juan Manuel Fangio. “Then I started thinking, now I’m gonna pay attention.”
He soon made contacts in Europe, traveling over to smaller card shows a couple times each year to hunt down rare F1 cards. A little less than a year ago, he opened a pack of 1984 Panini F1 Grand Prix Scratch N' Play, famous as the set that contains Ayrton Senna’s most valuable rookie card.
Not only did he pull a Senna out of the pack, it was in near-perfect condition. Of the 123 total graded by PSA, only one had been graded a PSA 9 with none higher.
This would become the second.
Produced by the Italian card maker at the very beginning of Senna’s F1 career — the same year he won his first of 41 Grand Prix races — the card has become one of the most sought-after pieces from the career of one of the sport’s greatest icons, who tragically died during a 1994 race at the San Marino Grand Prix.
The top sale for the card came from a PSA 7 example, which sold for more than $45,000 in 2022. Another PSA 7 sold for $18,600 in March 2024 and a PSA 8 sold for less than $18,000 in November.
Goldin is selling the newly-found PSA 9 copy in its Goldin 100.
It currently has received one bid, bringing it to $12,200, with buyer’s premium, and more than two weeks remaining at auction.
The consignor of the Senna card also has another rare F1 lot at Goldin: Enzo Ferrari’s rookie card from c.1924-25. Produced by Italian candy brand Cioccolato Helvetia as a sticker set, the stickers could also be redeemed for a collector album to store the set.
He obtained it at another European show when he met a man with a stack of stickers from the set in semi-rigid holders, including two Ferraris. Both featured his name in red, one of the two variations of the rare card — the other including his name in black.
The consignor graded it with PSA, receiving a PSA 4 — the only copy ever graded by the company. SGC has graded a handful of both variants, though none higher than a 3.
“That’s not showing up in Cleveland,” he said, expressing the rarity of the card and the lengths he goes to source similar pieces.
The Ferrari rookie, which uses a photo of the future automobile trailblazer from 1920 when he was 22, three years before he won his first Grand Prix and nearly two decades before he founded Ferrari, is listed at Goldin with a starting bid of $5,000.
The top price paid for one of the cards, an SGC 1 “name in black” variation, was $33,000 in 2023.
Will Stern is a reporter and editor for cllct.