Looking back, it did not take long for Ferrari to establish the marque as one of the outstanding racing/sport brands. It goes back to 1948-1949 when Ferrari won a number of important races -- Le Mans, the Mille Miglia, etc. See the "Racing" section in the Wikipedia article for details.
The car that brought Ferrari to fame was the 166MM, represented by the Barchetta, with a V-12 of just 2 liters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrari_166-S