Aston Martin V12 Zagato - what a car

Aston Martin presented the V12 Zagato in Cernobbio last weekend. It was entered into the Concorso d'Eleganza Villa d'Este and won its category, the concept cars and prototypes of 2010/2011.
It's quite an impressive machine, clearly a race car. The red one will be driven by Ulrich Bez himself at the 24 hours of Nurburgring in July. Ulrich Bez told me that he is looking forward to it.
The V12 Zagato continues a tradition that had it's best time in 1960 when Zagao produced the DB4 GT Zagato, a truely iconic early super car. But today's version is impressive as well, especially when you start the engine. Its sound is amazing. Have a look at the pictures to see the elegant shape ...

100 Years of Rallye Monte Carlo

100 years ago the first Rallye Monte Carlo was started. Challenges, rules and setup changed from year to year and initially it was more a reliability and regularity test than a speed race. Only in the 60ies they invented the special sections where speed was king. From time to time they invented funny rules, such as the more people you have in the car you more points you gain, or a design evaluation where Coupés were more valuable than Convertibles. Most of us probably remember the times of the Mini Cooper, Alpine A110, Porsche 911, Lancia Stratos, Audi Quattro and the Group B.
On zwischengas you find an article for each year and plenty of pictures (in total more than 200) and it's quite interesting to see the winners and losers coming and going.

One that you can buy - Amilcar C6 Grand Prix Car

Here's again a car, that is for sale. It attracted my attention because it has a lovely patina and combines Grand Prix feeling with a road registration. It's a 1927 Amilcar C6 with a straight six cylinder engine with a double overhead camshaft, a dry sump system and a compressor. When the C6 was launched in 1926 it achieved no less than 74 victories in that year, such as the Italian Grand Prix, the Provence Grand Prix and the Brooklands 200 Miles. The C6 was also the first 1100ccm car to go reach speeds above 200 km/h.
The car for sale at VDV is in completely original state, with a fully reconditioned engine. There's no mentioning of the sales price, but it won't come cheap, but could be worth every penny!

Picture of the Week - Abarth

Carlo Abarth built some of the best sportscars in the 60ies and early 70ies. Many won big races despite a engine size deficit. And many great driver was a works driver with the Abarth team. Many of the cars were beautifully shaped, but efficiency was more of a concern for Carlo Abarth than beauty. When he sold his company to Fiat the end was soon to come, too bad. Today you can again buy Abarth cars, but they are mostly tuned Fiat derivates. However there's a rumour that a new lightweight sportcar might be arriving!

With the GT40 at Le Mans - difficult to beat this

The Ford GT40 is one of the all time best sportscars ever. Not only did it win Le Mans more than once it also successfully competed on many other racetracks around the world. And you could even drive the car on the road. It looked good as well, but, Gee, the sound was just incredible, as the enclosed (not new) video from a lap at Le Mans (Classic 2008) clearly points out:

Remember the Ford Capri RS 2600?

In March 1970 Ford presented the Ford Capri RS 2600. It delivered 150 HP with its 2.6 liter engine, quite something at that time! It was derived from the touring car and at the same time the basis for many racing versions to come. With its twin lights and the Kugelfischer injection it was steps ahead from the rest of the Capri range. Everybody wanted to have one.

Hudson Hornet - a nearly invincible car in stock car racing

Remember the Pixar movie "Cars"? Most of the cars in this computer animated film were modeled after real cars, i.e. the Fiat 500, the Porsche, and the Hudson Hornet. The local judge was the Hudson Hornet character, a grumpy old cars having been highly successful in racing in its better days. And it's actually a true story. The Hudson Hornet proved to be almost invincible in stock car racing during the early 50ies. Despite this racing success, sales didn't really follow and the car has almost disappear from the landscape. Even more exciting is it therefore when you can actually see one racing up the hill in Switzerland (Europe), as it happened last weekend at the Steckborn-Eichhölzli classic car hillclimb 2010. It is an impressive car, even if you can't really spot the racing genes.

Langwies-Arosa in the JWF Milano GT - Arosa ClassicCar Hillclimb 2010

It's certainly one of the more selective and challenging hillclimbs in Europe. 7.8 km long, 78 curves, 450 m up the hill and a 1.2 km downwards section. No wonder the local guys are usually faster than the ones travelling from abroad. How does it feel? The video showcases the five and a half minute drive with the JWF Milano GT.

Arosa ClassicCar 2010 - exciting cars and optimal conditions

This year's Arosa ClassicCar hillclimb enjoyed almost optimal (weather) conditions. Except for some rain on Friday for the training the sun was shining and temperatures were just right for classic cars. The Arosa hillclimb is one of the most selective and challenging ones I know off. 7.8 km long, 78 curves (though some say 76). The fastest cars, for example my favorite, the Porsche 906 (Carrera 6), run in approximately 4 minutes and 40 seconds up the hill. But even if you take 5:30 you are still doing an average of approximately 90 km/h, regardless of the three hairpins and many narrow bends. The event features regularity and competition classes. As usual most of the cars are in the regularity class, but even these pilots are trying to optimize their uphill time. As said Friday was rainy, resulting in quite some crashes during the training. My JWF Milano GT showed some misfires because of high humidity, but then got much better on Sunday finally. I actually managed to become 10th of more than 140 drivers on Saturday in regularity, by pure luck though. Sunday I successfully tried to improve my lines and speed up the hill, so didn't give anything on regularity any more. Interesting was the comparison of the JWF with the Ford Galaxie 500 starting just behind each other. The JWF almost fits into the trunk of the Galaxie, probably has only half (or less) the horsepower, but on the bendy road is clearly faster than the Falcon, no wonder, right.
Everybody I talked to was very happy and excited about the race and most probably will come back next year again. I am still in the process of compiling a little movie that I will post later on.

Coming Arosa ClassicCar - Sept 9 to 12, 2010

In roughly 10 days this year's Arosa ClassicCar 2010 will going to attract again many classic car fans and an impressive list of participant cars. It's somewhat the Nurburgring of the Alps, in a hillclimb setup. Have a look at the advertisement and you can spot the black JWF Milano GT (right side) being entered again this year! Hopefully the weather will be as nice as last year of better!

Highlight - World Sportscars Master race at this year's AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring

One of the highlights in this year's AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring was the World Sportscars Master race showcasing a number of Porsche 904, 906, 907 and 908, as well as many variations of Ford GT40, Lola T70 and Chevron B8/B16. What a sound! And how beautiful the cars of that age were! Have a look yourself and enjoy the movie!

Picture of the Week - Monza Lister Jaguar

Isn't this a great picture? It shows a historical formula car, called Monza Lister Jaguar. It competed in the AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix at the Nurburgring 2010 against other historical formula 1 cars, but clearly outshined most of them with its impressive chrome type body. It's a great object to take pictures from. Though I must say, I am glad that I don't have to clean it after a partially rainy weekend.

We need more race tracks! Like this one.

A couple of investors are building a new race track in Germany, integrated into a natural scenery, leveraging an old military area. They will rent it to private drivers, car manufacturers and its own members. Sounds like an interesting concept, but doesn't come cheap. They are looking for some 30+ million Euro in financing, you can contribute starting at 100k. I like the idea and hope that hopefully soon somebody will implement a similar concept in my neighborhood. With all these traffic monitoring, speeding cameras and more and more regulated streets, the race track is the only place where classic sportscars really can driven as they should!
I wish all the best to the chaps from Bilster Berg, make it work, it looks great on the investment brochure!

Here's one to buy - Crosslé 9S 1962

Fancy a roadgoing race car? Here's a unique opportunity to buy a 1962 Crosslé 9S 1962 with road registration (Switzerland)! Crosslé is an Irish race car manufacturer, similar to Lotus or Elva, but much less known. The Crosslé designs were quite comparable to what these bigger car makers produced in the 60ies and thereafter. The car advertised in Switzerland produces a roaring 220 HP and weighs 540 kg, sounds like a good basis for great driving pleasure! I am not sure about FIA HTP though.

Driving a Lotus 11 on a narrow oval bicycle racetrack

Once per year a number of older race cars reconvene on a narrow bicycle racetrack forming an oval in Zurich-Oerlikon. The race cars are a show block for the bicycle races, but for the spectators often it is the highlight. And so it is for the drivers! It's quite something special to drive a classic race car through the steep curves. About 3 g downforce isn't something you are used to with an old car. But apparently it's a lot of fun and that's why the drivers happily return every year. To get a feeling what it means to drive these cars around the oval have a look at the presented video showing a Lotus Eleven (1956) in the oval. Impressive!

The new Ferrari 458 Challenge - better, but better?

Yes, this is the brand new, just announced, Ferrari 458 Challenge. It beats its predecessor (430 Challenge) by 2 seconds in Fiorano and that's a lot, it's kind of a racing light year! So, these new cars get better and better, faster and faster, but is this really better? Do all these electronic gizmos really help to make the good driver look good and the bad one suffer? I doubt it. And it's not even that exciting to observe as it's so bloody controlled. Let's go back to less electronics, smaller tires and more fun, that's why I still prefer old racing cars.

Ayrton Senna on Honda NSX driving at the Nurburgring

I just came across this spectacular video picturing the unforgettable Ayrton Senna driving the Honda NSX around the Nurburgring. Yes, there's a lot of marketing bla bla around it, but get to 4:10 or so and you'll see some serious driving action from Ayrton. And, yes, having owned two NSX in my life, this is a car that stands out from the crowd and I don't mind owning a third one sometimes in the future.

Picture of the Week - Elva MK3

Here's yet another interesting race car to see in full action: The Elva MK3. It has been racing for years in Germany and is pictured in probably its last race here at the AVD Oldtimer Grand Prix 2006. It was quite quick and so was the driver, a very friendly chap. The car had quite an impressive history, but probably had been changed quite a number of times to continue and stay in competition. I wasn't successful buying it, so it went into a museum. Elva comes from French "elle va" which means "she goes". Elva was a pretty successful maker of race cars and partially also street cars, the best known car probably was the Elva Courier, but racers rather remember these barchettas, be it the MK2, MK3, MK4 or the fabulous MK7.

Devin-D project for sale in the US

Hi, I friend of mine just told me about this Devin D that is for sale as a project in the US. Devin Ds are pretty rare! This one comes with Porsche 1600 SC engine, tubular frame and is said to be mostly complete, so a good restoration basis. This nice car could become either a street or a race car. From a body perspective the car is similar to the Devin TR also highlighted in this blog, but it had its own chassis and of course the engine sits in the back of the car. To my knowledge there are two or three Devin Ds in Europe, one of them is a nicely restored car in Austria. The car here is not cheap but fairly priced. It has a competition history from the 60ies apparently and could become competitive again with its low weight and powerful engine. If anybody wants to know more then contact me through this blog or any other mean.

What is better? BMW M3, Ford Sierra Cosworth or Mercedes 190 2.3 16?

Yes, the boys are back. TopGear is on air again. Last Sunday they were given the challenge to buy a family track day car on a budget of GBP 5'000.-. Well the boys arrived with a E36 M3, a Mercedes 190E 2.3 16 valve (homologation car) and a Ford Sierra Cosworth. I wonder whether you could find the Merc at apparently 3'000 GBP here as it already follows the famous E30 M3 as a collector's item. And even the E36 M3 fetches better prices than what Hamster was able to buy it for (though apparently an accident car). Anyway the challenge was fun and the winner accidental (Merc). I wonder which of the three cars you would prefer. For me it's the Mercedes 16 valve Cosworth car for it's pure racing pedigree (highly successful in touring car championship). But if they had added an E30 BMW M3 then the choice would have been more clear.