Now more than ever, smart buying is about condition, mileage, history and provenance. To retain – or increase – value in this changing market your classic needs to be the proper thing. The real deal with no stories. And that means rebuilt or refreshed mechanicals, straight shimmering paint, equal panel gaps, retrimmed or rejuvenated interior, neat boot and under bonnet areas and lots and lots of paperwork. The veracity of the mileage is important too, so make sure it’s made credible by a paper trail of bills and sheaves of previous MoT certificates. Nobody wants to buy work or projects now. In fact, quite the opposite. The most desirable cars are the ones where successive owners have lost their shirts spending money preserving and pampering their classics. That’s where the strongest value is – where you’re paying sometimes less than a quarter of the total of what’s been spent on a classic over the years. And those deals are out there, more now than ever. As prices soften, more classics will look irresistible by virtue of the sums previously invested by their starry-eyed owners. The shifting market landscape of 2022 could unlock some of the greatest classic car value that we’ve seen for years. Make sure you choose wisely and buy smart.
Not heavy Kudos to Richard Bremner for writing such a brilliant piece on the S.S.1 Airline. I’ve often seen that car at Jaguar Heritage’s collection centre in Gaydon so it was great to read more about its history and what it’s like to drive. I will take issue with Richard, though, describing it as “heavy around the rear”. I think – and most will agree – it’s a very handsome car and not at all as Richard described. Thanks again for a great site.
No less interesting marked the centenary of Jaguar was a masterful piece of publishing, covering all bases of the company’s 100 years. I especially liked the biographies of nine important people and could easily have read nine more! I also liked the E-type and DB6 twin test, two cars I will never, sadly, get to buy myself but that made the article no less interesting. And sorry to read Paul Walton is suffering my issues with his XF Sportbrake. I had a similar car for a few years and similar problems, finally selling it in 2018 for – whisper it – a Honda SUV which (fingers crossed) has been bullet proof so far. Jaguar certainly needs to improve its reliability if it’s to reach another 100 years! Congratulations to all the team for such a great magazine and keep up the good work.
Welcome to our May issue – I don’t know about you, but it feels like this year is flying by; maybe it’s the contrast with the last two years’ glacial pace caused by lockdowns and Covid. This month’s magazine features not one, but two purple muscle cars. This wasn’t deliberate, it’s just a bit like the old bus analogy – we had one then another one turned up very shortly after and we just had to share them both with you.
In some ways they represent different ends of the muscle car spectrum. The ’67 GTO is nearer the beginning of this halcyon period, while the ’72 ’Cuda the end. And that’s the funny thing, the muscle car era barely lasted a decade, yet it’s the era that many enthusiasts wax lyrical about or obsess over… I wonder in the future if the era we’re living through now will be referred to as the Second Muscle Car wave?
After all, you can buy outrageously powerful Camaros, Mustangs, Corvettes and Challengers today… will that be the case in a decade? Hmmmm, what do you think?
Also kicking off this month is the story of my own muscle car’s restoration; it was something I knew eventually I would have to undertake, but I’d been procrastinating about for years, but then events overtook me and I was forced to bite the bullet. There is something quite nice about having a scruffier car, as it means you can enjoy it more without worry. “Another ding? Nah, who cares…!” With an immaculate car, a lot of the fun evaporates, as worries about scratches or worse come to the fore. Well, I hope you’re looking forward to a summer of fun, getting out and enjoying your vehicles!
The Auto Italia radar, I'm sure, detected that Antonio Mandelli has announced the revival of the Cizeta name, with what is tantamount to a new car, but still centred on that unique V16 engine. In the definitive book on the Cizeta cars by Brian Wiklem it is explained that, rather as Dauer bought Bugatti EB110 stock, Mr Mandelli did the same with Cizeta Automobili some time ago, to develop his own modified version, formerly known as the Mandelli Monza.
This Auto Italia reader noticed the repeat of one fact that was refuted by Mr Wiklem, that it was Giorgio Moroder's investment which turned Claudio Zampolli into an independent manufacturer. In fact the author alleges activity had been underway a year already, for Sylvester Stallone was the wealthy friend originally enthused by the talented Zampolli to back his enterprise. The famous actor was a customer of his, very into Lamborghini supercars at the time, evinced by the Jalpa in 1985's Rocky IV. It seems he moved on from Cizeta when the Mimrans asked him about becoming involved in Lamborghini affairs instead. Consequently, the V16 engine already existed and was secretly being road tested by Mr Zampolli in a cut-and-shut Ferrari 308 GTB by the time Giorgio Moroder came on board. He said himself that it was the sight of the engine that convinced him the endeavour was serious and had prospects. I still support the theory that the car was conceived by Zampolli in the early 1980s as an offering to Lamborghini's new owners, the Mimran brothers, to put into production alongside the Countach as a companion model, derived from it, but oriented at the US market. One can see why, when he was later turned down and Claudio decided to create and sell the car himself, he would not want people to see it as a Lamborghini reject. A car to be the next Lamborghini would explain why the Cizeta Moroder was to have a chassis of rectangular (cuboid) tubes instead of cylindrical tubes, a curious choice for a hand-built car. Roundsection tubes can be lighter for the same strength, so they were and still are preferred in motor racing and would be expected for a handmade prestige supercar of the highest quality and price, as the Cizeta eventually became. Round tubes were difficult to machine-weld at the time, so a series production supercar typically used squaresection tubes. The famous motor mogul Bob Lutz, at Chrysler under Lee Lacocca during the Lamborghini era, said that he asked Tom Gale and William Dayton of their Design Center to restyle the Diablo in 1987 precisely because it looked too much like the Cizeta Moroder and not enough like the Countach. It took a year to arrive at a compromise all could agree on — Gandini redid the nose, Chrysler redid the rear. Telling, though, that the altered Diablo still bore Gandini's name on the flank, whereas the purer Cizeta Moroder never did. Well, that's the theory I believe, anyway. Would that Claudio were still here to set the record straight for himself, although Auto Italia did interview him, so we have that. It is a sad fact that many of the people who knew the truth of the greatest era for the cars we like, the 1950s-1980s, are passing beyond the veil now, leaving a lot of vacuum that will fill with whatever prejudice people are happy to believe. I still read, if never in Auto Italia, assertions like Ferruccio Lamborghini storming off to make the Miura after a fight with Enzo Ferrari when in reality they never even met, or that the Lancia Beta and Fiat 128 are merely synonyms for rust bucket, not that they advanced front-wheel drive car design by at least 10 years. Bravo to those who keep trying, but please, heroes, do tell your stories. And tell them here!
The Ferrari Meera S feature was special not only due to the exclusivity of the car, but also because not many motoring publications have ever written about it.
As the car was first commissioned by Saudi royalty, it was the subject of a test drive in an Arab motor magazine called Sport Auto in Saudi Arabia when it was (almost) new in the April 1985 issue. The magazine publishers loved the car so much they made it the cover star, where you can see it driven at speed, kicking up dust! This article is special in many ways. Sport Auto was the first (and only) to introduce Arab readers to the Michelotti-modified Ferrari. It includes the only photos of the Meera while sporting the original KSA registration plates. It also corroborates many of the facts you mentioned, such as having Tateo Uchida as codesigner, technical specifications, the exposed circuits and diodes in the transparent dashboard (so hard to read in dark, according to Sport Auto) and the rearview video camera. One photo showed this camera hanging on the top right corner of the rear screen, very reminiscent of CCTV cameras used in banks in the 1980s!
The last paragraph in the Sport Auto article might help add to ownership timeline and value. It translates: “For the record, this car is a one-off, and ended up in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where it was sold for one million Saudi Riyals. However, it is now up for sale for 400,000 SAR.”
In November last year I lost another of my Motor colleagues in November last year – Tony Dron, who was a year younger than me, but had long suffered from a lung condition. He joined Motor in 1971, having won the Sir William Lyons Award for budding motoring writers in 1968. In many ways we were opposites, Tony having almost a pop-star image and personality, with hair style and clothes to match, and me in grey flannels and sports jacket and something of a shrinking violet by comparison. But for some reason we hit it off and became firm friends, until he left in 1974.
This was mainly to concentrate on his professional motor racing career which I think began in Formula Vee, but soon went on to touring cars. For some reason (perhaps we were on the way back from MIRA), I was with him when in 1974 we sat in Ralph Broad’s office in Southam and Tony pitched for a Triumph Dolomite Sprint works drive in the BTCC Championship. He got it too, and proved capable of beating the top drivers of the day. He drove a Unipart March F3 car in 1976 and raced internationally, including Sebring, Spa and Le Mans (where he won his Class in 1982 with a Porsche).
After many seasons as a professional driver, in later years he became a top historic racer, winning the Sussex Trophy at the Goodwood Revival for three consecutive years. In fact, if you want to see and hear Tony in action, try and find a copy of the Sideways in a D-type DVD, which features him in a Ferrari sparring with Win Percy in Nigel Webb’s D-type. Magnificent stuff! Tony was another wonderful person who I will always remember with affection and respect.
Tony Dron in Nigel Webb’s ex-Duncan Hamilton C-type (XKC 004) during a press preview day at Goodwood in 2006, where he gave rides to journalists and guests. Photo: Tony Bailey.
Tony Dron making a rare appearance in an E-type – Anthony Hutton’s mod-sport car prepared by Forward Engineering which Paul arranged for him to track test for Motor around 1972. Photo: Paul Skilleter.
Roger Bell was a leading automotive journalist who joined Motor magazine as a young man in 1959. In Jaguar terms, it’s interesting to note that he was delegated the job of compiling the magazine’s first road test of the new Mark X.
The test appeared in November 1963 and was remarkably critical at a time when some journalists enjoyed a rather too-friendly relationship with manufacturers, and tended to gloss over faults and failings in new models. But not Roger, and in the case of the Mark X, refinement, powertrain noise, the ‘skin-deep quality’ of the woodwork, inefficient heating and an ‘absurd lack of lateral support’ from the seats, were features he commented adversely on. After the test was published, Roger was invited to Browns Lane ‘for a chat’ and he was somewhat taken aback when on arrival he was ushered into a room full of engineers and given a good grilling! But his observations were basically fair and he became a leading road tester, before being promoted to Editor of Motor in 1973.
I had joined Motor in April 1966 and two years later it was Roger who gave me my first drive of an E-type – a story I have related before in these pages. The magazine had borrowed a press E-type roadster (JDU 877E) for a Group Test, and after it had returned from being belted round north Wales, I found on my desk a note from Roger which said something like, ‘In view of your interest in Jaguar, you might like to take the E-type for the weekend’. Would I like to?! So, there followed two days of great joy, driving this yellow ultra-high-performance two-seater Jaguar around the countryside. All these years later I still deeply appreciate Roger’s thoughtfulness. Roger was a fine driver and was highly successful in the British Touring Car Championship in the early/mid-1970s, being runner-up in his Class twice. He drove mainly 3.0 litre BMWs for Dealer Team BMW, but piloted other marques too.
He left Motor in 1981 to edit Thoroughbred & Classic Cars and contributed as a freelance to various other titles and newspapers – so when I conceived a bookstall magazine on Jaguar (Jaguar Quarterly), Roger was one of the first writers I turned to. In the first issue of JQ, published in the autumn of 1988, he wrote an informed piece on three modified Jaguars we had assembled for him – Janspeed XJ6 Turbo, Lister XJ-S and Lynx Performer. Later, he tested JaguarSport products for us. In recent years, Roger suffered from Parkinson’s and it was sad he eventually succumbed to the disease. But I will always remember him with gratitude and admiration.
The yellow E-type Series 1 1/2, which Roger Bell allowed Paul to drive can be seen amongst other cars on this 1968 Group Test. Roger Bell, journalist, editor, author and race driver, pictured around 1970.
Porsche sports cars set new records at Amelia Island Auction
Last month, we brought you news of the superrare Porsches set to go under the hammer at the Gooding & Company Amelia Island Auction. A 1959 718 RSK set pulses racing in advance of the sale, as did a fine selection of other special sports cars from Zuffenhausen, including a 2005 Carrera GT and a 1993 964 Carrera RS 3.8 Clubsport, the latter built at the request of Tobias Hagenmeyer, CEO of transmission giant, Getrag. Presented in black with yellow accents, the air-cooled rarity features seven wholly unique characteristics not found on any other RS 3.8. A 1998 RUF Turbo R Limited also generated interest in the lead-up to the sale, scheduled a day ahead of the weekend’s Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance. Then, just as we went to print, Gooding & Company announced a late entry to proceedings: 904/6 chassis 906-011, a historically significant Porsche race car which made its debut at the Le Mans test weekend in April 1965 and, later that year, was entered in the Mont Ventoux Hillclimb and the Grand Prix of Solitude. After this season, the car was retired from Porsche’s racing department.
All Porsches offered at the Amelia Island auction were sold, the leading example being the 718 RSK, which achieved $2,975,000 after an engaging bidding war. 904/6 chassis 906- 011, meanwhile, achieved a remarkable figure of $2,205,000. The aforementioned Carrera GT shattered the recently set world record at auction for the model by selling for $2,012,500 (eclipsing the $2,000,000 million achieved earlier this year), while the Hagenmeyer 964 Carrera RS 3.8 Clubsport also set a new model world record, yielding a final sale price of $1,875,000.
Within the same realm, the gorgeous 993- based Riviera Blue RUF Turbo R Limited stunned auction attendees by becoming the most valuable RUF ever purchased at public sale, generating an unanticipated winning bid of $2,040,000. Modern 911s also commanded strong sale prices at the auction, where Porsche was the most represented marque. A 2001 996 GT2, for example, sold for $240,800, while a 2018 991 Gen II GT3 Touring brought in $302,000 after a considerable bidding battle. The event’s most successful lot? A 1937 Talbot-Lago T150-C-SS Teardrop Coupe, which fetched $13,425,000.
Of the nineteen auction lots generating more than $1m, eight were Porsches. Late entries included a pair of 1979 935 race cars (sold for a respectable $1,765,000 and $1,462,500) and a 1974 Carrera 3.0 RSR IROC, one of only fifteen 911s specially built for Roger Penske’s legendary race series. RSR chassis 911 460 0085 is one of the few 911s which competed in all four IROC races in 1973/1974. In the first race, Indycar hero, Gordon Johncock piloted the car to a tenth-place finish. For the second event, McLaren F1 driver, Peter Revson, finished fourth. Johncock found himself back in the red RSR for race three, finishing eleventh after throttle linkage issues.
For the season finale in early 1974, the top six performers went head-to-head at Daytona Speedway. AJ Foyt took the controls of this iconic RSR, but finished in sixth place after engine failure early on. Even so, the car’s special history was enough to attract $1,627,500 at Amelia Island.
One man did more than most to highlight the Eastern Bloc car scene in Britain and across Europe, and the launch of this bookazine coincides unfortunately wth his passing. It seems fitting to dedicate this publication to Julian Nowill — a gentleman and a fount of Communist car knowledge; someone with whom I had hoped to speak and learn while compiling this guide and someone who will be missed by all who knew him. These pages will reflect his passion. I hope you enjoy the stories within.
I have read a few comments on social media snubbing the idea of an all-wheel drive M3, I think these detractors need to get real. While I would be the first to admit that the driving dynamics of M3s of old would’ve been ruined had they been four-wheel drive, people need to realise that modern M cars have enormous amounts of power and therefore performance, the likes of which would overpower a traditional two-wheel drive setup and likely be beyond the control of most mere mortals if they were strictly rear-drive. From what I understand the new systems still prioritise drive to the real wheels, but switch to all four only when absolutely necessary – so what’s the problem?
I really enjoyed your feature on Matt Swanborough’s E38 7 Series, not only because I found the story quite touching but also because I found what Matt said about its colour really quite interesting.
These days it seems nearly every car is black or grey, so the purple Mora metallic on Matt’s E38 is a reminder of how people were a bit braver with colour choice not so long ago. It might be my imagination that the 1990s delivered more colourful cars, but I’m certain there were brighter hues back in the 1970s, which is part of what makes classic cars of that era so appealing in my view. Maybe we all need to be a little more adventurous when speccing our new BMWs in future?
‘It’s always a thrill to be around cars such as the 26R and the GTO, but it’s the people who have owned and raced them that fascinate me most. Talking to Jackie Oliver and Nick Mason this month was therefore the icing on the cake.’
Driving a Ferrari 250 GTO has been one of the high points of my career, as it seems to be for any motoring hack that has had the privilege (associate editor Glen Waddington has also driven one, though he doesn’t like to mention it… at least not more than once an hour).
‘Mine’ was actually a late car (4675 GT) from the Matsuda collection in Japan and it was a big deal at the time – early 2010 – because it was due to be the first to come up for sale at public auction for a very long time. that meant that a value would finally be ‘out there’ to end the speculation over how far prices might have risen. In the end, it sold privately before the RM sale so we had to wait another four years to have our curiosity satisfied, when Bonhams sold 3851 GT for $38,115,000 (£22,843,633 at the time) at the Quail. More recently, John Collins of Talacrest was openly asking £45m for the Bernie Carl car (3387 GT), and they have probably gone up a bit since then.
But the truth is that all these obscene numbers are irrelevant because a GTO transcends such trivialities. It is all about the experience, and few people have had more GTO adventures than Pink Floyd drummer and former Octane columnist Nick Mason, who paid a then world record £37,000 (yes, thousand) for 3757 GT in 1978. This must be the most storied of all GTOs, less for its first life with Jacques Swaters’ Ecurie Francorchamps (although third overall at both Le Mans and in the Tour Auto is not to be sniffed at), but for its life since 1978, whether that be multiple appearances in Historic racing or being loaned to journalist Mel Nichols, who kept it street-parked in London.
To mark the 60th anniversary of this iconic model, Nick has shared his memories and passion with us and in the process reawakened my own recollections of my GTO day in 2010. Truth be told, it was not as glamorous as it looked in the pictures. the shoot by James Lipman took place at Shoeburyness and the weather was so vile that we huddled together for warmth with our chaperone Max Girardo (then of RM), and for the cornering shots my then-colleague Martin Port had to lie in the footwell and hold the door closed. Yet it was still one of the greatest days of my working life. It’s all about the experience.
Now more than ever, smart buying is about condition, mileage, history and provenance. To retain – or increase – value in this changing market your classic needs to be the proper thing. The real deal with no stories. And that means rebuilt or refreshed mechanicals, straight shimmering paint, equal panel gaps, retrimmed or rejuvenated interior, neat boot and under bonnet areas and lots and lots of paperwork. The veracity of the mileage is important too, so make sure it’s made credible by a paper trail of bills and sheaves of previous MoT certificates. Nobody wants to buy work or projects now. In fact, quite the opposite. The most desirable cars are the ones where successive owners have lost their shirts spending money preserving and pampering their classics. That’s where the strongest value is – where you’re paying sometimes less than a quarter of the total of what’s been spent on a classic over the years. And those deals are out there, more now than ever. As prices soften, more classics will look irresistible by virtue of the sums previously invested by their starry-eyed owners. The shifting market landscape of 2022 could unlock some of the greatest classic car value that we’ve seen for years. Make sure you choose wisely and buy smart.
Not heavy Kudos to Richard Bremner for writing such a brilliant piece on the S.S.1 Airline. I’ve often seen that car at Jaguar Heritage’s collection centre in Gaydon so it was great to read more about its history and what it’s like to drive. I will take issue with Richard, though, describing it as “heavy around the rear”. I think – and most will agree – it’s a very handsome car and not at all as Richard described. Thanks again for a great site.
No less interesting marked the centenary of Jaguar was a masterful piece of publishing, covering all bases of the company’s 100 years. I especially liked the biographies of nine important people and could easily have read nine more! I also liked the E-type and DB6 twin test, two cars I will never, sadly, get to buy myself but that made the article no less interesting. And sorry to read Paul Walton is suffering my issues with his XF Sportbrake. I had a similar car for a few years and similar problems, finally selling it in 2018 for – whisper it – a Honda SUV which (fingers crossed) has been bullet proof so far. Jaguar certainly needs to improve its reliability if it’s to reach another 100 years! Congratulations to all the team for such a great magazine and keep up the good work.
Welcome to our May issue – I don’t know about you, but it feels like this year is flying by; maybe it’s the contrast with the last two years’ glacial pace caused by lockdowns and Covid. This month’s magazine features not one, but two purple muscle cars. This wasn’t deliberate, it’s just a bit like the old bus analogy – we had one then another one turned up very shortly after and we just had to share them both with you.
In some ways they represent different ends of the muscle car spectrum. The ’67 GTO is nearer the beginning of this halcyon period, while the ’72 ’Cuda the end. And that’s the funny thing, the muscle car era barely lasted a decade, yet it’s the era that many enthusiasts wax lyrical about or obsess over… I wonder in the future if the era we’re living through now will be referred to as the Second Muscle Car wave?
After all, you can buy outrageously powerful Camaros, Mustangs, Corvettes and Challengers today… will that be the case in a decade? Hmmmm, what do you think?
Also kicking off this month is the story of my own muscle car’s restoration; it was something I knew eventually I would have to undertake, but I’d been procrastinating about for years, but then events overtook me and I was forced to bite the bullet. There is something quite nice about having a scruffier car, as it means you can enjoy it more without worry. “Another ding? Nah, who cares…!” With an immaculate car, a lot of the fun evaporates, as worries about scratches or worse come to the fore. Well, I hope you’re looking forward to a summer of fun, getting out and enjoying your vehicles!
CIZETA MUSINGS
The Auto Italia radar, I'm sure, detected that Antonio Mandelli has announced the revival of the Cizeta name, with what is tantamount to a new car, but still centred on that unique V16 engine. In the definitive book on the Cizeta cars by Brian Wiklem it is explained that, rather as Dauer bought Bugatti EB110 stock, Mr Mandelli did the same with Cizeta Automobili some time ago, to develop his own modified version, formerly known as the Mandelli Monza.
This Auto Italia reader noticed the repeat of one fact that was refuted by Mr Wiklem, that it was Giorgio Moroder's investment which turned Claudio Zampolli into an independent manufacturer. In fact the author alleges activity had been underway a year already, for Sylvester Stallone was the wealthy friend originally enthused by the talented Zampolli to back his enterprise. The famous actor was a customer of his, very into Lamborghini supercars at the time, evinced by the Jalpa in 1985's Rocky IV. It seems he moved on from Cizeta when the Mimrans asked him about becoming involved in Lamborghini affairs instead. Consequently, the V16 engine already existed and was secretly being road tested by Mr Zampolli in a cut-and-shut Ferrari 308 GTB by the time Giorgio Moroder came on board. He said himself that it was the sight of the engine that convinced him the endeavour was serious and had prospects. I still support the theory that the car was conceived by Zampolli in the early 1980s as an offering to Lamborghini's new owners, the Mimran brothers, to put into production alongside the Countach as a companion model, derived from it, but oriented at the US market. One can see why, when he was later turned down and Claudio decided to create and sell the car himself, he would not want people to see it as a Lamborghini reject. A car to be the next Lamborghini would explain why the Cizeta Moroder was to have a chassis of rectangular (cuboid) tubes instead of cylindrical tubes, a curious choice for a hand-built car. Roundsection tubes can be lighter for the same strength, so they were and still are preferred in motor racing and would be expected for a handmade prestige supercar of the highest quality and price, as the Cizeta eventually became. Round tubes were difficult to machine-weld at the time, so a series production supercar typically used squaresection tubes. The famous motor mogul Bob Lutz, at Chrysler under Lee Lacocca during the Lamborghini era, said that he asked Tom Gale and William Dayton of their Design Center to restyle the Diablo in 1987 precisely because it looked too much like the Cizeta Moroder and not enough like the Countach. It took a year to arrive at a compromise all could agree on — Gandini redid the nose, Chrysler redid the rear. Telling, though, that the altered Diablo still bore Gandini's name on the flank, whereas the purer Cizeta Moroder never did. Well, that's the theory I believe, anyway. Would that Claudio were still here to set the record straight for himself, although Auto Italia did interview him, so we have that. It is a sad fact that many of the people who knew the truth of the greatest era for the cars we like, the 1950s-1980s, are passing beyond the veil now, leaving a lot of vacuum that will fill with whatever prejudice people are happy to believe. I still read, if never in Auto Italia, assertions like Ferruccio Lamborghini storming off to make the Miura after a fight with Enzo Ferrari when in reality they never even met, or that the Lancia Beta and Fiat 128 are merely synonyms for rust bucket, not that they advanced front-wheel drive car design by at least 10 years. Bravo to those who keep trying, but please, heroes, do tell your stories. And tell them here!
MEERA OF ARABIA
The Ferrari Meera S feature was special not only due to the exclusivity of the car, but also because not many motoring publications have ever written about it.
As the car was first commissioned by Saudi royalty, it was the subject of a test drive in an Arab motor magazine called Sport Auto in Saudi Arabia when it was (almost) new in the April 1985 issue. The magazine publishers loved the car so much they made it the cover star, where you can see it driven at speed, kicking up dust! This article is special in many ways. Sport Auto was the first (and only) to introduce Arab readers to the Michelotti-modified Ferrari. It includes the only photos of the Meera while sporting the original KSA registration plates. It also corroborates many of the facts you mentioned, such as having Tateo Uchida as codesigner, technical specifications, the exposed circuits and diodes in the transparent dashboard (so hard to read in dark, according to Sport Auto) and the rearview video camera. One photo showed this camera hanging on the top right corner of the rear screen, very reminiscent of CCTV cameras used in banks in the 1980s!
The last paragraph in the Sport Auto article might help add to ownership timeline and value. It translates: “For the record, this car is a one-off, and ended up in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where it was sold for one million Saudi Riyals. However, it is now up for sale for 400,000 SAR.”
Super coupe had test — thanks
In November last year I lost another of my Motor colleagues in November last year – Tony Dron, who was a year younger than me, but had long suffered from a lung condition. He joined Motor in 1971, having won the Sir William Lyons Award for budding motoring writers in 1968. In many ways we were opposites, Tony having almost a pop-star image and personality, with hair style and clothes to match, and me in grey flannels and sports jacket and something of a shrinking violet by comparison. But for some reason we hit it off and became firm friends, until he left in 1974.
This was mainly to concentrate on his professional motor racing career which I think began in Formula Vee, but soon went on to touring cars. For some reason (perhaps we were on the way back from MIRA), I was with him when in 1974 we sat in Ralph Broad’s office in Southam and Tony pitched for a Triumph Dolomite Sprint works drive in the BTCC Championship. He got it too, and proved capable of beating the top drivers of the day. He drove a Unipart March F3 car in 1976 and raced internationally, including Sebring, Spa and Le Mans (where he won his Class in 1982 with a Porsche).
After many seasons as a professional driver, in later years he became a top historic racer, winning the Sussex Trophy at the Goodwood Revival for three consecutive years. In fact, if you want to see and hear Tony in action, try and find a copy of the Sideways in a D-type DVD, which features him in a Ferrari sparring with Win Percy in Nigel Webb’s D-type. Magnificent stuff! Tony was another wonderful person who I will always remember with affection and respect.
Tony Dron in Nigel Webb’s ex-Duncan Hamilton C-type (XKC 004) during a press preview day at Goodwood in 2006, where he gave rides to journalists and guests. Photo: Tony Bailey.
Tony Dron making a rare appearance in an E-type – Anthony Hutton’s mod-sport car prepared by Forward Engineering which Paul arranged for him to track test for Motor around 1972. Photo: Paul Skilleter.
Roger Bell was a leading automotive journalist who joined Motor magazine as a young man in 1959. In Jaguar terms, it’s interesting to note that he was delegated the job of compiling the magazine’s first road test of the new Mark X.
The test appeared in November 1963 and was remarkably critical at a time when some journalists enjoyed a rather too-friendly relationship with manufacturers, and tended to gloss over faults and failings in new models. But not Roger, and in the case of the Mark X, refinement, powertrain noise, the ‘skin-deep quality’ of the woodwork, inefficient heating and an ‘absurd lack of lateral support’ from the seats, were features he commented adversely on. After the test was published, Roger was invited to Browns Lane ‘for a chat’ and he was somewhat taken aback when on arrival he was ushered into a room full of engineers and given a good grilling! But his observations were basically fair and he became a leading road tester, before being promoted to Editor of Motor in 1973.
I had joined Motor in April 1966 and two years later it was Roger who gave me my first drive of an E-type – a story I have related before in these pages. The magazine had borrowed a press E-type roadster (JDU 877E) for a Group Test, and after it had returned from being belted round north Wales, I found on my desk a note from Roger which said something like, ‘In view of your interest in Jaguar, you might like to take the E-type for the weekend’. Would I like to?! So, there followed two days of great joy, driving this yellow ultra-high-performance two-seater Jaguar around the countryside. All these years later I still deeply appreciate Roger’s thoughtfulness. Roger was a fine driver and was highly successful in the British Touring Car Championship in the early/mid-1970s, being runner-up in his Class twice. He drove mainly 3.0 litre BMWs for Dealer Team BMW, but piloted other marques too.
He left Motor in 1981 to edit Thoroughbred & Classic Cars and contributed as a freelance to various other titles and newspapers – so when I conceived a bookstall magazine on Jaguar (Jaguar Quarterly), Roger was one of the first writers I turned to. In the first issue of JQ, published in the autumn of 1988, he wrote an informed piece on three modified Jaguars we had assembled for him – Janspeed XJ6 Turbo, Lister XJ-S and Lynx Performer. Later, he tested JaguarSport products for us. In recent years, Roger suffered from Parkinson’s and it was sad he eventually succumbed to the disease. But I will always remember him with gratitude and admiration.
The yellow E-type Series 1 1/2, which Roger Bell allowed Paul to drive can be seen amongst other cars on this 1968 Group Test. Roger Bell, journalist, editor, author and race driver, pictured around 1970.
Porsche sports cars set new records at Amelia Island Auction
Last month, we brought you news of the superrare Porsches set to go under the hammer at the Gooding & Company Amelia Island Auction. A 1959 718 RSK set pulses racing in advance of the sale, as did a fine selection of other special sports cars from Zuffenhausen, including a 2005 Carrera GT and a 1993 964 Carrera RS 3.8 Clubsport, the latter built at the request of Tobias Hagenmeyer, CEO of transmission giant, Getrag. Presented in black with yellow accents, the air-cooled rarity features seven wholly unique characteristics not found on any other RS 3.8. A 1998 RUF Turbo R Limited also generated interest in the lead-up to the sale, scheduled a day ahead of the weekend’s Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance. Then, just as we went to print, Gooding & Company announced a late entry to proceedings: 904/6 chassis 906-011, a historically significant Porsche race car which made its debut at the Le Mans test weekend in April 1965 and, later that year, was entered in the Mont Ventoux Hillclimb and the Grand Prix of Solitude. After this season, the car was retired from Porsche’s racing department.
All Porsches offered at the Amelia Island auction were sold, the leading example being the 718 RSK, which achieved $2,975,000 after an engaging bidding war. 904/6 chassis 906- 011, meanwhile, achieved a remarkable figure of $2,205,000. The aforementioned Carrera GT shattered the recently set world record at auction for the model by selling for $2,012,500 (eclipsing the $2,000,000 million achieved earlier this year), while the Hagenmeyer 964 Carrera RS 3.8 Clubsport also set a new model world record, yielding a final sale price of $1,875,000.
Within the same realm, the gorgeous 993- based Riviera Blue RUF Turbo R Limited stunned auction attendees by becoming the most valuable RUF ever purchased at public sale, generating an unanticipated winning bid of $2,040,000. Modern 911s also commanded strong sale prices at the auction, where Porsche was the most represented marque. A 2001 996 GT2, for example, sold for $240,800, while a 2018 991 Gen II GT3 Touring brought in $302,000 after a considerable bidding battle. The event’s most successful lot? A 1937 Talbot-Lago T150-C-SS Teardrop Coupe, which fetched $13,425,000.
Of the nineteen auction lots generating more than $1m, eight were Porsches. Late entries included a pair of 1979 935 race cars (sold for a respectable $1,765,000 and $1,462,500) and a 1974 Carrera 3.0 RSR IROC, one of only fifteen 911s specially built for Roger Penske’s legendary race series. RSR chassis 911 460 0085 is one of the few 911s which competed in all four IROC races in 1973/1974. In the first race, Indycar hero, Gordon Johncock piloted the car to a tenth-place finish. For the second event, McLaren F1 driver, Peter Revson, finished fourth. Johncock found himself back in the red RSR for race three, finishing eleventh after throttle linkage issues.
For the season finale in early 1974, the top six performers went head-to-head at Daytona Speedway. AJ Foyt took the controls of this iconic RSR, but finished in sixth place after engine failure early on. Even so, the car’s special history was enough to attract $1,627,500 at Amelia Island.
The next gen model was GAZ 24 Volga — the same peace of shit
One man did more than most to highlight the Eastern Bloc car scene in Britain and across Europe, and the launch of this bookazine coincides unfortunately wth his passing. It seems fitting to dedicate this publication to Julian Nowill — a gentleman and a fount of Communist car knowledge; someone with whom I had hoped to speak and learn while compiling this guide and someone who will be missed by all who knew him. These pages will reflect his passion. I hope you enjoy the stories within.
Nice conversion — but petrol power of V8 is just perfect
Four-wheel-drive M3
I have read a few comments on social media snubbing the idea of an all-wheel drive M3, I think these detractors need to get real. While I would be the first to admit that the driving dynamics of M3s of old would’ve been ruined had they been four-wheel drive, people need to realise that modern M cars have enormous amounts of power and therefore performance, the likes of which would overpower a traditional two-wheel drive setup and likely be beyond the control of most mere mortals if they were strictly rear-drive. From what I understand the new systems still prioritise drive to the real wheels, but switch to all four only when absolutely necessary – so what’s the problem?
Colour Of Love
I really enjoyed your feature on Matt Swanborough’s E38 7 Series, not only because I found the story quite touching but also because I found what Matt said about its colour really quite interesting.
These days it seems nearly every car is black or grey, so the purple Mora metallic on Matt’s E38 is a reminder of how people were a bit braver with colour choice not so long ago. It might be my imagination that the 1990s delivered more colourful cars, but I’m certain there were brighter hues back in the 1970s, which is part of what makes classic cars of that era so appealing in my view. Maybe we all need to be a little more adventurous when speccing our new BMWs in future?
Very toll car
Original brochure image from 1977
Very strange and agricultural-spec of fiat 124
‘It’s always a thrill to be around cars such as the 26R and the GTO, but it’s the people who have owned and raced them that fascinate me most. Talking to Jackie Oliver and Nick Mason this month was therefore the icing on the cake.’
That special experience
Driving a Ferrari 250 GTO has been one of the high points of my career, as it seems to be for any motoring hack that has had the privilege (associate editor Glen Waddington has also driven one, though he doesn’t like to mention it… at least not more than once an hour).
‘Mine’ was actually a late car (4675 GT) from the Matsuda collection in Japan and it was a big deal at the time – early 2010 – because it was due to be the first to come up for sale at public auction for a very long time. that meant that a value would finally be ‘out there’ to end the speculation over how far prices might have risen. In the end, it sold privately before the RM sale so we had to wait another four years to have our curiosity satisfied, when Bonhams sold 3851 GT for $38,115,000 (£22,843,633 at the time) at the Quail. More recently, John Collins of Talacrest was openly asking £45m for the Bernie Carl car (3387 GT), and they have probably gone up a bit since then.
But the truth is that all these obscene numbers are irrelevant because a GTO transcends such trivialities. It is all about the experience, and few people have had more GTO adventures than Pink Floyd drummer and former Octane columnist Nick Mason, who paid a then world record £37,000 (yes, thousand) for 3757 GT in 1978. This must be the most storied of all GTOs, less for its first life with Jacques Swaters’ Ecurie Francorchamps (although third overall at both Le Mans and in the Tour Auto is not to be sniffed at), but for its life since 1978, whether that be multiple appearances in Historic racing or being loaned to journalist Mel Nichols, who kept it street-parked in London.
To mark the 60th anniversary of this iconic model, Nick has shared his memories and passion with us and in the process reawakened my own recollections of my GTO day in 2010. Truth be told, it was not as glamorous as it looked in the pictures. the shoot by James Lipman took place at Shoeburyness and the weather was so vile that we huddled together for warmth with our chaperone Max Girardo (then of RM), and for the cornering shots my then-colleague Martin Port had to lie in the footwell and hold the door closed. Yet it was still one of the greatest days of my working life. It’s all about the experience.