2014 is the 100th anniversary of Maserati and they’ll be highly visible at several events next year. The announcement came out today that they’ll be the featured marque at the 2014 Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion.
If it guarantees that there’ll be more scenes like this one of a ’57 250F leading a ’39 4CL through the Corkscrew, then 2014 will be a photogenic year indeed.
If you thought sportscar design has diminished over the past few decades, this narrator will turn your attention as well to the state of voiceover work.
I know I’m cutting it close, but just in time for some last minute stocking stuffers for the racing fan in your life… Or you. Probably for you… it’s OK, you deserve it.
Some of these I’ve been incredibly delinquent in re-ordering, so it’s been quite a while since the Riverside or Legends of the 60’s shirts have been available.
Head on over to the Chicane Shop for more.
For the none of you that need a reminder of why the Ecurie Ecosse team and it’s iconic transporter are so important, Bonhams assembled this marvelous video with some little-seen racing footage of the team in various years of competition.
Goodwood TV tagged along with (now former) Ecurie Ecosse collection owner Dick Skipworth as the 1959 Commer TS3 Ecurie Ecosse transporter made her farewell journey to the Bonhams auction in London from Buckinghamshire. Two days later the iconic transporter brought in a staggering £1.7 Million. I’m more interested in the passing of stewardship from one enthusiast to another than I am in the loot it brought in… And Dick is a true enthusiast. You can tell that this was a bittersweet moment for Dick and I love seeing this wistful interview with him.
I echo Dick’s sentiments when he expresses his hopes that the transporter, and the entire collection, goes to a new home and owner that will use them properly. He frequently describes the transporter as practical and useful. Just like classic racing cars should be used to race, classic racing car transporters should be used to transport racing cars. Only time will tell if Dick’s dreams for the future of the Ecurie Ecosse collection come to pass.
I haven’t seen any further confirmation of this, but Dick Skipworth seems to think that the transporter, C-Type, and D-Type all went to the same Stateside bidder—which is fantastic news (for those of us on this side of the pond). The fact that Dick’s son took home the Sprite is also a wonderful result!
Via FortyOneSix
Edit: Just this morning, Sports Car Market confirmed that the C-Type, D-Type, and transporter did indeed all go to the same U.S. buyer!
Artist Fabian Oefner creates the illusion of beautifully exploding machines using a combination of modelmaking, sketching, photography, and digital manipulation. They’re almost balletic in how delicately they’re presented.
The results are still arrestingly beautiful, but part of me was disappointed to see that these are more Photoshop than sculptural. How fantastic would that exploded P4 look on your mantle as a physical object in the vein of a small scale version of Jonathan Schipper’s “Slow Inevitable Death of American Muscle”? Time to break out the Testors.
via Top Gear.
Giorgio Oppici sent in his spectacular short film showcasing a perfectly patinaed Cisitalia D46. There are a lot of ways to make a film about a car, but usually they feature quick cuts, loud music, and booming exhaust notes. They get your adrenaline up. They get you excited about the subject. Advertisers and music video directors have known how to pull those emotions out of us for a long time.
Giorgio’s approach is the exact opposite. This isn’t a music video (although the music is perfect). This doesn’t get your adrenaline up. It doesn’t even motivate. What it does do is all the more rare. It forces you to pause… To appreciate… To wonder. It is a love letter to the magnificent Cisitalia D46 that I want to read again and again.
Thank you for sending this in, Giorgio. It’s fantastic. Check out Giorgio’s equally beautiful film on BMW Motorcycles that we featured last year.
Bonhams upcoming December auction featuring the Dick Skipwworth Ecorie Ecosse Collection has no shortage of amazing racing cars included (and one Hell of a nice transporter too), and even though this Cooper-Monaco won’t draw in the top dollar bids the way that the D-Type or C-Type will, it might be my favorite of the bunch. The rear-engined Type 57 is surely one of the most beautiful sports-racing cars to come out of Cooper Car’s garages, if not the whole of the UK racing community. Those elegant curves wrapped around that miraculous little 2 1/2 liter Coventry Climax twin cam just make me smile.
Cooper delivered the cars to purchasers as a kit, and if I were to choose any single example I think I’d be most inclined to trust the one built by this legendary team. It won’t surprise you to learn that this little beauty has a magnificent race history with events on both sides of the Atlantic. Formula Libre events at Watkins, Riverside, and Laguna Seca (with Jack Brabham in the wheel for Laguna) wonderfully complement her European history at Goodwood, Oulton Park, Aintree, and LeMans. Arguably her best years, however, came when the car was entrusted to Ecurie Ecosse driver Jimmy Stewarts scrappy kid brother Jackie. He took to the machine wonderfully and racked up a series of victories right out the gate. Can you imagine owning a car that has been driven by both Jack Brabham and Jackie Stewart (and Roy Salvadori! And more!)?
Bonhams is offering this car alongside many of her Ecurie Ecosse stablemates at their December auction. I sincerely hope that a very well heeled buyer comes along and nabs them all. They really do deserve to remain together, don’t you think?
More information on Bonhams’ lot detail page.
“Welcome to Automotive Paint Supplies, Ltd., How can I help you?”
“I would like any two colors of paint, please. Whatever the first two cans of paint you can reach are, I want those.”
Begone Dull Care!
Let the spirited Elite introduce you to the joys of Lotus motoring, derived from unique specification: glass-reinforced plastic unitary construction all independent suspension, four wheel disc brakes, Coventry Climax 1214 cc power unite. Lotus Elite – LeMans 1960— 1300 cc class First, Index of Thermal Efficiency First. Manufactured and distributed by: LOTUS Cars Ltd. Delamare Road, Cheshunt, Hertfordshire. Telephone Waltham Cross 26181.
Wow. Now there’s an unformatted pile of text that is very difficult to make any sense of. I can only imagine that this was dictated over the phone to the advertising editor at the BARC Gazette and just transcribed and keylined in. It looks almost like a telegram of the ad’s copy.
Let’s just concentrate on those lovely lines of the Elite’s bodywork instead. There, that’s better.