Octane -julkaisun May 2026 -irtonumeron sisällysluettelo

IT DOESN’T SEEM long enough ago that everyone was talking about the 1980s as the hot-spot of the classic car market, and there are plenty of people (those with a shed full of Audi R8s or suchlike, presumably) already talking up the post-millennial generation. But while the Noughties are inevitably the ‘next big thing’, right now the 1990s is where it is at. Big time. And why not? 1990s cars are old enough to be interesting, and in most cases entirely analogue, but young enough to be used as daily drivers. Plus many are absolute bargains at the moment, though you’ll need to be quick. Plenty have already taken off price-wise, but, as our industry experts attest using experience with previous generations of classics as a yardstick, unless you are…

One of the great joys of my life in motorsport is the travelling. One of the biggest curses of my life in motorsport is the travelling. I am a farm boy from West Sussex and, growing up at least, I never thought that I would ever get to see the world. The world was a much bigger place back in the late 1960s, when I started racing internationally. Getting anywhere abroad was a feat in itself. Even more so if you were towing a racing car. Oh, the joys of dealing with border crossings, carnets, and currency exchanges. However, I climbed the ranks and became a paid professional but, even then, the glamour part of travelling remained elusive. Trust me, being a Formula 1 driver in a middling team way…

WINNER RENAULT CLIO WILLIAMS Value now: £21,600 5-year change: +19% Largest demographic share: Gen X (61.5%) Octane ratings (out of 5)  Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ FRANK WILLIAMS’S eponymous Formula 1 team switched to Renault V10 engines in 1989, and in 1992 Williams driver Nigel Mansell dominated the World Championship. Renault sought to capitalise on the success with a limited-edition hot hatch bearing the Williams name and this was the result – although the then-Didcot (Grove from ’96), Oxfordshire team played no part in the development of the car. Hot Clios had kicked off in 1991 with the quick and well-sorted 16S (in France) and 16V (for export markets). That was powered by…

WINNER BMW E39 M 5 Value now: £41,000 5-year change: +14% Largest demographic share: Millennials (36.1%)  Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ BMW RAISED the super-saloon game with the E28 M5 in 1984. Like an automotive foreshadow of the era when it became acceptable in certain circles to wear running shoes with a suit (but no tie), it looked like any other 5-series from the outside but packed a 286bhp punch thanks to a new version of the M1 supercar’s motorsport-derived 24-valve straight six. The E34 M5 of 1988 also had six-cylinder power, but for the third iteration of the M5, launched in 1998, BMW switched to a broad-shouldered…

WINNER BUGATTI EB110 Price now: £1.1M 5-year change: +75%  Largest demographic share: Baby Boomers (38.5%) Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ MODERN-ERA BUGATTI began here, with a sprawling project kicked off in the mid-1980s by Ferruccio Lamborghini, the ex-Lamborghini engineer Paolo Stanzani, designer Nuccio Bertone and entrepreneur Romano Artioli. Artioli was the money man with a marketing vision, and became the central figure in the rebirth of Bugatti. While Stanzani wanted the car to focus on light weight, Artioli demanded a luxurious interior, and Stanzani initially specified an aluminium honeycomb structure where Artioli wanted carbonfibre for additional strength. It all came to head in the summer of 1990, when Stanzani left the…

JAMES ELLIOTT Editor-in-chief • 1965 Triumph 2.5 PI • 1968 Jensen Interceptor • 1969 Lotus Elan S4 ROBERT COUCHER Founding editor • 1955 Jaguar XK140 GLEN WADDINGTON Associate editor • 1989 BMW 320i Convertible • 1999 Porsche Boxster • 2001 BMW 525i Sport Touring SANJAY SEETANAH Advertising director • 1981 BMW 323i Top Cabrio • 1998 Aston Martin DB7 Volante CHARLIE MAGEE Photographer • 1965 MGB Roadster • 1971 Range Rover DAVID LILLYWHITE Editorial director • 1971 Saab 96 • 1991 VW Golf Mk2 GTI MATT HOWELL Photographer • 1962 VW Beetle 1600 • 1969 VW/Subaru Beetle • 1982 Morgan 4/4 BEN BARRY Contributor • 2007 Mazda RX-8 MASSIMO DELBÒ Contributor • 1967 Mercedes-Benz 230 • 1972 Fiat 500L • 1982 Mercedes-Benz 500SL • 1985 Mercedes-Benz 240TD SAM CHICK Photographer…

HE WAS AS LARGE in life as he was big in stature. Bill Mitchell was a design colossus who bestrode the American motor industry during an era when anything seemed possible. According to legend, he was a natty dresser with a well-defined sense of humour; a born raconteur and showman who had no time for the mundane. This was reflected in the cars created by General Motors under his watch as design czar. The biggest of The Big Three sold 72m cars shaped or signed off by Mitchell over a 19-year period, let’s not forget. That said, according to some accounts from those who worked under him, Mitchell was also boorish and bigoted, a womanising lush whose outsized ego crushed all before him. Tellingly, there are just as many who…

QUARTZ TECHNOLOGY DISRUPTED motor racing timing even more profoundly than it transformed mainstream watchmaking. Initially expensive but coming down rapidly in price, accurate, reliable and easy-to-read quartz timers almost completely replaced mechanicals. Heuer’s Microsplit was the first quartz chronograph with a digital display and 1/100 sec accuracy. These were quartz’s early days, so the display was a light emitting diode (LED) array where the numbers glowed red and ate through batteries. They were hard to read in sunlight, too, so Heuer thoughtfully provided a little folding sunshade over the display. You should be able to find one, still with its original box and instructions, for around £350-450.…

ONE OF THE rarest Porsches is also one of the most interesting. Just three examples plus a prototype of the 968 Turbo RS were built in 1993 as the ultimate version of what had begun as the humble 924 in 1976. Here was a lightweight racer that combined the balance and aerodynamics of the 968 body with the strength of the 944 Turbo engine, bored out to 2990cc and boosted with a KKK K27 turbocharger to produce 350bhp, linked to a six-speed manual gearbox and Torsen diff ’. Lowered and with a full roll-cage, the car was claimed to be quicker than the Carrera RSR 3.8! A run of 100 968 Turbo S homologation models was planned, detuned to 305bhp with a more comfortable interior. Yet buyers stayed away. At…

WHAT TO PAY The very nicest Montecarlos are highly prized by their owners, but occasionally escape onto the open market. When they do, expect to pay anywhere from £20,000 to £30,000 for something of concours standard, especially in Europe. Honest, solid and presentable examples start nearer to £10,000, however, and for around £15,000 you can find something very tidy. Project cars with potential for betterment can be found from about £5000. LOOK OUT FOR Structural corrosion can be a car killer, so carefully inspect the firewall, wheel wells, floorpan and rear crossmember. Pay close attention to bubbling around the front suspension turrets, as this area can hide terminal rot. The box sections that the doors hinge from can trap dirt at the bottom and corrode. Inspect the inner and outer…

ANDREW NOAKES ‘The great cars of the 1990s are now getting the recognition they deserve, but the experts I spoke to all agreed that one thing about the market hasn’t changed: condition and history are still what count the most.’ From hot hatches and coupés to GTs and hypercars, these are the best buys: pages 58-75. RICHARD HESELTINE ‘It’s a privilege to drive any early Ferrari, especially when it’s one that redefined the marque in a way that we have known it ever since: as a maker of road cars. The 195 Inter wasn’t the friendliest of cars to drive, but it rewarded perseverance.’ Read all about Richard’s perseverance on pages 76-84. MASSIMO DELBÒ ‘I was so excited about driving the Bugatti Type 49, but a week with the Dallara Stradale left…

THE GRIMALDI FORUM Monaco will finally hold the huge exhibition celebrating the Principality’s links with motoring that was postponed in 2020 due to the pandemic. ‘Monaco & the Automobile, from 1893 to the Present Day’ opens on 1 July and will span 4000m2 and feature around 50 vehicles, including more than 20 that have triumphed in the Monaco Grand Prix or the Monte Carlo Rally. They will be displayed alongside artefacts from the Princely Family and unseen items from the Automobile Club de Monaco. It is believed to be the biggest motoring exhibition ever held in Monaco and organisers promise that ‘alongside exceptional vehicles, visitors will discover a selection of objects, documents, photographs and videos – some unseen – illustrating the relationship between Monaco and the automobile, from its origins…

Nostalgia was once defined as a psychosis. So I certainly don’t want to be described as nostalgic. But that’s not to deny feeling a sense of malaise about the condition of ‘design’ today. The New Yorker journalist Becca Rothfeld put it nicely: ‘It is a sign of fatally limited imagination to assume that we can only ever desire the pittance to which we are currently reconciled.’ This means we deserve better. And since she mentions ‘pittance’, it’s chastening to consider the riches of a recent past. The generation being fed AI slop is too young to recall the visceral thrill of the last Audi 100, a metal car that embodied all the pleasures to be had from fine design and interesting engineering: flamboyantly understated surfacing on an impressive aerodynamic shape,…

WINNER NISSAN SKYLINE R33 GT-R Value now: £58,500 5-year change: +17% Largest demographic share: Millennials (60.66%) Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ NISSAN’S 1989 SKYLINE GT-R R32 was built to win in Group A sports car racing in Japan, which it did astonishingly well: 29 victories from 29 starts. When the R33-generation GT-R appeared in 1995 it shared plenty with its predecessor, but there were detail improvements that made it faster and more sure-footed. The engine was basically the same RB26DETT twin-turbo, 2.6-litre straightsix with twin overhead cams and four valves per cylinder. There was a small increase in maximum boost, a lighter and more efficient intercooler, and a…

WINNER AUDI RS2 AVANT Price now: £81,000 5-year change: +29% Largest demographic share: Millennials (48.1%) Octane Ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻  Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ BACK IN THE MID-1990s, if you wanted to get from a standstill to 30mph quicker than you could in a McLaren F1, you needed one of these. With 300bhp and Quattro four-wheel drive, the Audi RS2 was Audi’s fastest road car of the time, and almost unbeatable off the line – with or without a dog in the back. Ferdinand Piëch, then head of the Audi supervisory board, was behind the project and brokered the deal for the car to be developed by Porsche. The mainstream Audi engineering…

THE RAUTUVAARA MINE’S hoisting tower is a post-war concrete monolith that once hauled millions of tonnes of magnetite from the Finnish bedrock. Today it rises silently from the Arctic landscape like a lighthouse in a nuclear winter. To a Brit, it seems miraculous that people once toiled in such an unforgiving place. It’s -30°C, but the prospect for today is infinitely more appealing than a sub-zero shift underground. Porsches can be heard idling outside the nearby log cabin, flat-six exhaust plumes hanging in the glacial air, seemingly impatient as Huskies waiting to mush. It’s likely that few 911s have ventured as far north as this intrepid collection. While their counterparts are tucked away in the warmth of winter hibernation, these machines will be driven hard in temperatures that turn 10W-60…

ROBERT HEFFERON Art editor • 2004 BMW Z4 3.0i RICHARD HESELTINE Contributor • 1971 Honda Z600 TON ROKS Contributor • 1977 Alfa Romeo Giulia • 1977 MGB V8 Roadster PETER BAKER Contributor • 1934 Sunbeam 25 • 1956 Daimler Conquest Century • 2005 Maserati 4200GT DAVID BURGESS-WISE Contributor • 1924 Sunbeam 14/40 • 1926 Delage DISS JOHN MAYHEAD Contributor • 1946 MG TC • 1970 VW Type 2 Westfalia • 1988 Porsche 944 MATTHEW HAYWARD Markets editor • 1990 Citroën BX 16v • 1994 Toyota Celica GT-Four • 1997 Peugeot 306 GTI-6 • 2000 Honda Integra Type R • 2002 Audi A2 JESSE CROSSE Contributor • 1968 Ford Mustang GT 390 • 1986 Ford Sierra RS Cosworth MARTYN GODDARD Photographer • 1963 Triumph TR6SS Trophy • 1965 Austin-Healey 3000 MkIII…

THERE WEREN’T MANY chances to use the Golf in my first few weeks of ownership. Salt on the roads, time away for Christmas, lots more time away for work… all the usual excuses. But I’m determined to drive the Golf regularly, otherwise there really would have been little point to buying it. A quick trip to a nearby village pub on New Year’s Day was the proper first outing. The car felt great but the exhaust was vibrating annoyingly and the rear wiper proved to have a life of its own. A bit of Googling revealed that the wiper problem was almost certainly a broken live feed within the gaiter between the body and the tailgate, and sure enough that proved to be the case. Out with the soldering iron…

IN SEPTEMBER 1925 an unusual cabin-like structure appeared in a Manhattan store at 1659 Broadway, in which for 25 cents it was possible to pose for a strip of eight sepia-toned photographs that would be automatically delivered to the sitter less than ten minutes later. In no time attendants had to be on hand to control the crowds queuing to use the machine and stretching along the street, 2000 a day by one estimate. Barely six months after its installation, 300,000 punters had deposited their quarters in the Photomaton. ‘Selfie’ fever had arrived. The Photomaton was the brainchild of 32-year-old Siberian émigré Anatol Josepho (originally Josephewitz) who arrived in the US in 1923 after studying photography in Germany and spending a number of years working as a photographer as far…

£5,224,572 ($7,045,000) 1959 Ferrari 250 California LWB RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £5,102,208 ($6,880,000) 2015 Ferrari LaFerrari RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £3,878,568 ($5,230,000) 1992 Ferrari F40 RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £3,830,975 ($5,230,000) 2015 Ferrari LaFerrari RM Sotheby’s, Boca Raton, Florida, USA, 14 February £3,674,628 ($4,955,000) 2024 Bugatti Bolide RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £2,532,564 ($3,415,000) 2017 Pagani Huayra RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £2,450,988 ($3,305,000) 2005 Porsche Carrera GT RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £1,961,532 ($2,645,000)  2023 Ferrari 812 Competizione A RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £1,920,744 ($2,590,000)  1969 Ferrari 365 GTS RM Sotheby’s, Coral Gables, Florida, USA, 27 February £1,920,744 ($2,590,000) 2020 McLaren Senna GTR RM…

From 1955 to 1963 the 108mph W121 Mercedes-Benz 190SL defied all price:performance comparisons. Although its halo has dimmed a tad in the last five years, historic price growth makes a mockery of them still. It’s all about the cachet cash can buy, thanks to New York-based importer Max Hoffman, whose vision convinced Mercedes to produce the 300SL Gullwing and Roadster. He fulfilled his pledge to sell 1000 of each, then persuaded Mercedes that a cheaper, similar-looking four-cylinder would see 10,000 sales. The result sold 25,881, more than 10,000 in the US. In 1955, the 1.9-litre 190SL, which retained drum brakes to the last, cost £2776 in the UK. The six-cylinder 3.4-litre Jaguar XK140 roadster that far outpaced it was a full £1000 cheaper. At the end of production in 1963,…

1980 Lancia Montecarlo €30,000, Link Motors, Italy Exceptionally clean and original Series 2 coupé, with just 68,000km showing and only two previous owners. Said to be concours-worthy, and benefiting from a recent mechanical overhaul. 1978 Lancia Beta Montecarlo £20-30k, Iconic Auctioneers, UK One of the very last Series 1 cars built, a very rare right-hand-drive Spider. Fully restored some years ago, it has been used sparingly since. It still looks great and comes with a comprehensive history.…

Three Castles Trial 2-5 June This North Wales event, with a mix of tests and tourism, has long been promoted as the ideal stepping stone from gentler tulip-book rallies to serious competitive events. Based in Llandudno, it will have around 20 regularities and 20 driving tests over three days and there are two classes, the Classic Category for all cars 1954-1985 or the Heritage Category for pre-war and precious cars up to 1953. three-castles.co.uk Jersey Concours D’Elegance 13 June Jersey is to host its fifth Concours D’Elegance in People’s Park, St Helier. The prestigious event is organised by specialist Le Riche Automobile Restorers, with principal sponsor ROK Group. There is free admission and this year’s event promises to be extra-special, celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Channel Islands’ first concours.…

WITH CONCOURS season already underway, here are some updates on a few of the upcoming events. Salon Privé London (at the Royal Hospital Chelsea, 16-18 April, salonprivelondon.com) is promising a big celebration of Trident heroes on the Saturday to honour the centenary of Maserati’s first big race win. An all-Italian selection of cars is promised at the inaugural Anantara Concorso in Rome (16-19 April, anantaraconcorsoroma.com), including the Keller Collection’s Peninsula Best of the Best-winning ’38 Alfa Romeo 8C 2900B (above, see also Octane 274). San Diego’s 20th La Jolla Concours (24-26 April, lajollaconcours.com) returns with the theme Icons of Speed: Historically Significant Super Cars. One of the most popular selections at the London Concours (Honourable Artillery Company, 9-11 June, londonconcours.co.uk) is expected to be the Tuners class backed by Adrian…

‘DRIVEN: Britain’s Motoring Story’ is the bold title of the next major exhibition at the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu, which opens at the end of March. The display will be held in the new-look entrance hall and upper gallery, highlighting a recent £600,000 programme of works to improve the museum, part-funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Garfield Weston Foundation, the Wolfson Foundation, and the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Community Foundation. It will focus on five eras of motoring, from pioneers to the rise of EVs, and will work in tandem with the Smartify app, offering extra content that includes films, photos and insight. Beaulieu has also revealed that its Land Speed Record Sunbeam 1000HP, currently being prepped to run (rather more sedately) at Daytona Beach on the centenary…

As I get more and more into cars, I meet people who are more and more into watches. In fact, I seem to run into a lot of people to whom high horology has become the new F1. No doubt Netflix’s fantastic series Drive to Survive is behind this. Before it, like many Americans, I had little interest in F1. The cars are too expensive, overly complex and bear hardly any technology that could apply to your everyday vehicle. This is why NASCAR was so popular in America. The cars that won the race looked suspiciously like what people drove, even using retro technology such as carburettors long after they’d become obsolete. To most Americans the F1 cars resembled atomic insects. They used something called downforce to overcome problems instead…

It’s a well-known fact that blokes like a list. A listing of the ‘Top 10’ in pretty much any subject will grab our attention as we mentally tally it with all the other lists filed in our heads. Especially when it comes to buying suggestions in the classic car world. I’ll come back to that in a moment, but first – by way of context – I need to talk about the misfortune I experienced when hiring two cars over Christmas and at the start of the ski season. The first was something by the name of Tonale. I’d never heard of nor seen one before but it’s a mid-sized SUV by Alfa Romeo. It has the attractive Alfa ‘face’ and generic SUV looks and it swallowed the family and…

WINNER LOTUS ELISE S1 Value now: £24,000 5-year change: +46% Largest demographic share: Gen X (43.4%)  Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼◼◼◻◻ Club/specialist support ◼◼◼◼◻ Ease of ownership ◼◼◼◼◻ LOTUS RETURNED TO form with this mid-engined marvel. The Elise was rooted in Colin Chapman’s philosophy of lightweight engineering and, tipping the scales at just 725kg, it offered sparkling performance from just 118bhp of Rover K-series power. Key contributor to the Elise’s lightness was a novel structure – no surprise for a company with a history of innovative chassis construction, from the composite monocoque of the Type 14 Elite to the pragmatic backbone of the Type 26 Elan. Aluminium alloy extrusions were bonded and riveted to create a lightweight tub, and the technology was celebrated by leaving the raw…

WINNER ASTON MARTIN DB7 (I 6, MANUAL) Value now: £18,100 5-year change: -4% Largest demographic share: Baby Boomers (47.1%) Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ ◻ TOM WALKINSHAW was the architect of Jaguar’s successful return to top-flight sports car racing in the ’80s, and his TWR company partnered with Jaguar to build hot XJSs, the XJR15 and the XJ220 through the joint-venture JaguarSport concern. As a result of that relationship, Walkinshaw had the inside track on Jaguar’s future model plans – one of which had been a long-running XJ41/42 ‘F-type’ project with a fine Keith Helfet shape, which Ford canned soon after taking control of Jaguar in 1990. And let’s…

WINNER FERRARI 348 Price now: £45,300  5-year change: +0.4% Largest demographic share: Millennials (37.5%)  Octane ratings (out of 5) Investment potential ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ Club/specialist support ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ Ease of ownership ◼ ◼ ◼ ◼ ◻ THE FERRARI 348 should have had so much going for it: mini-Testarossa looks, more power than its aged predecessor, and a choice of fixed-roof and targa bodystyles, which were later augmented by a full convertible. Yet the introduction in 1989 of Ferrari’s new mid-range model didn’t exactly go as planned. ‘The 348 was a disaster when launched,’ says Banks. ‘It was nicknamed the shopping trolley by those who were conducting the pre-delivery inspections at Maranello Concessionaires.’ Early 348s were undercooked, with build quality issues and handling that could be nervous and tricky…

The scowl would be visible from space. A superfan (more likely an eBay shitehawk) starts delving into his third carrier bag full of goodies during the signing session, wilfully oblivious to the huge line of people behind him as well as the rictus grin of the F1 ace in front of him. Riccardo Patrese, dapper to a T but slightly hunched of shoulders in demeanour to give the impression of permashrugging, dutifully presses on with the signing and leaves it to the organisers to remove the offending ‘fan’. Eventually, somewhere towards the bottom of bag four, our barnacle is spirited away and Patrese instantly becomes more sanguine, shrugging (or not, who can tell?) insouciently when asked if he was that bothered by the incident: ‘Only because he was stopping other…

‘Like everyone right now, I’m looking to the skies, hoping for some rain to clean the salt off the roads so I can start driving classics. I’ve a big list of jobs, though, as it is service year for both Fiat 500 and Mercedes 240 TD’Massimo Delbò ‘I am going to use my classics more this year, and that starts with doing the shopping in the Morgan this morning. I just need to reattach the driver’s door first’Matt Howell ‘The gorgeous red Recaro seats in my Integra Type R are starting to look a little tired and could do with some new bolsters, so I’m gearing up to pull them out and give them a minor refresh’Matthew Hayward ‘My BMW Z4’s rear end was noticeably crashy, and a very worn…

Turini watch by De Rijke & Co and Guy Allen Back in 2024, De Rijke’s novel Amalfi model unexpectedly became a canvas for the art of Guy Allen, and the British illustrator was recently called upon to beautify the updated version of the watch, which boasts a ceramic case. As before, the dial can be rotated to make it easier to read while driving. Allen delivered drawings featuring a 911 rally car, a Camel Trophy-style Defender, and a Stratos, and each colourful artwork was transformed into a dial design by a labour-intensive process of engraving and champlevé enamelling. Only 50 examples of each design will be produced, and we reckon orders will come in especially quickly for the smart ‘Turini’, which features a little Stratos sliding its way up an…

OVER THE PAST 12 months, 2% of the cars advertised for sale in Europe and the UK that were tracked by Hagerty were noted as being racing cars, and 19% mentioned competition somewhere in their description, suggesting that this is an important element in their desirability for potential buyers. The first recorded race between two self-powered road vehicles over a set route took place in 1867 near Manchester between two steam carriages. History doesn’t record whether the result increased the winner’s value, but the race generated excellent publicity for both drivers’ engineering companies. Today, racing history is big business and Hagerty’s latest analysis shows that a competition pedigree of any sort can influence value, whether that’s a Schumacher Ferrari or an Austin J40 pedal car with Goodwood Settrington Cup credentials.…

25 March H&H Classics, Solihull, UK (motorcycles) 26 March Charterhouse, Sparkford, UK 27-28 March Branson Auction, Branson, USA 1 April Brightwells, online 2 April Ewbank’s, Send, UK 9-11 April Mecum, Houston, USA 10-11 April Manor Park Classics, Runcorn, UK 11-12 April ACA, King’s Lynn, UK 15-17 April Mathewsons, online 16-18 April Barrett-Jackson, Palm Beach, USA 18 April Barons Manor Park Classics, Southampton, UK 19 April Bonhams, Goodwood, UK Iconic Auctioneers, Old Warden Park, UK (motorcycles) 24 April Bonhams, Monaco 24-25 April RM Sotheby’s, Monaco 25 April Broad Arrow Auctions, Costa Messa, USA Cheffins, Cambridge, UK 25-26 April Bonhams, Stafford, UK (motorcycles) 26 April Hampson, Tattenhall, UK 29 April H&H Classics, Buxton, UK Manor Park Classics, Runcorn, UK 30 April SWVA, Poole, UK 1-2 May Vicari, Biloxi, USA 2 May WB…

1924 Alvis SB 12-50 Ducks Back £49,850 Recently back in the UK after spending 100 years in Australia, now fully restored and fitted with a close-ratio gearbox and a polished aluminium ‘Ducks Back’ body. Ready to be enjoyed. charlesleith.com (UK) 1972 Porsche 911E POA A beautifully preserved example, rebuilt and upgraded in more recent years with a very special 2.9-litre, twin-plug, magnesium-cased engine producing 270bhp. Subtle visual tweaks finish it off. canepa.com (US) 1952 Land Rover Series 1 80in $69,995 AUD Built at the very end of 1952 and delivered to Australia in CKD form, recently rescued and fully restored. Having suffered virtually zero corrosion, it retains almost all original parts. classicthrottleshop.com (AUS) 1958 Peugeot 403 Grand Luxe Convertible, €72,900 A somewhat nicer example of the car made famous by…

TRUE SUCCESS IS when loved ones tell you they’re proud of you, particularly your parents. My father and I both have dyslexia, we were diagnosed at the same time. I was a teenager, but he was over 40 – quite a shock for him, but it explained a lot. For me, being dyslexic made it difficult at school. The idea of becoming a racing driver like him didn’t appeal; I’m curious about people and what I enjoy is telling stories: real ones, not fictional. In my early 20s I worked as an actor, but it was behind the camera as a documentary film-maker that it all clicked. It started out as a hobby, but I took a course in Broadcast TV Production and started my own production company in 1994.…