EP24: Stonehenge by Mokka; Saxon & Gixxers

Posted on By Jon Summers No Comments on EP24: Stonehenge by Mokka; Saxon & Gixxers

Jon Summers is the Motoring Historian. He was a company car thrashing technology sales rep that turned into a fairly inept sports bike rider. On his show he gets together with various co-hosts to talk about new and old cars, driving, motorbikes, motor racing, motoring travel.

Notes

Transcript

[00:00:00] John Summers is the motoring historian. He was a company car thrashing technology sales rep that turned into a fairly inept sports bike rider. Hailing from California, he collects cars and bikes built with plenty of cheap and fast, and not much reliable. On his show, he gets together with various co hosts to talk about new and old cars, driving, motorbikes, motor racing, and motoring travel.

Good day, good morning, good afternoon. It is John Summers, the motoring historian. Um, Do another one of these on my own, I guess, because, uh, I recently had a trip to England and did a lot of, of car related things. Um, so a bit to talk about there. [00:01:00] I always feel like it’s important to begin with what’s, uh, with what’s really important and, and I always want this to be like a document of, of my own.

Um, motoring experiences and, and, uh, I guess, you know, the, the, the dog is out my feet as, as we speak, sitting on my feet and, and for the last six months, you know, when, and even recording this pod now is at the expense of going out for a walk with him and that really illustrates, uh, you know, how my life has, has been over the six or seven months that, that we as a, as a family of, of having, um, And I guess a lot of the time that I spent fiddling around with cars and bikes, I haven’t spent fiddling around with cars and bikes.

And, and, uh, the bikes particularly had reached a pretty powerless state. Now there’s, there’s, I mean, there’s a lot of them. It’s, it’s, you know, it’s, it’s less than 25, but [00:02:00] it’s, it’s, you know, more than 15 at the moment. And, um, and it reached a point where bloody none of them worked. I mean, how embarrassing is, uh, is that?

I. Um, so I, I suppose, you know, now where I I’m feeling better about the whole thing, because there’s, there’s three that work now I, I was able to persuade the venerable, uh, Honda shadow that was gifted me and I went and picked up in, in gold country last year. Um, I managed to get that started. It had not wanted to start before.

And I guess it’s because, um, the jigsaws have a, a choke that goes down to be on and up to be off. And, and the Ducati has this weird toggling mechanism that I, I can’t quite figure, but it’s more of a feel than a, um, it’s like clicks closed. So, you know, when it’s open and fully open by the way that it [00:03:00] feels well, and the jigsaws that are like upside down from Honda in terms of how you do the choke.

So anyway, I guess I’d struggled to get the Honda started the last time anyways, that runs. Um, More importantly, John has just done the clutch in the 2001 Suzuki GSX R K1 that I have, 1000 K1 that I have, that was owned by that Irish road race guy. Now, I guess the, it’s a fairly well known thing on them that the clutches become herky jerky.

Um, and. It’s also something that you won’t appreciate if you didn’t ride those bikes sort of in period in the way that I did is that the fueling, the, the, the fueling is, is not good. And what we mean by that is that this is early stage fuel injection. And we mean that the bike is going to [00:04:00] rev out to 14 grand.

Now, The fueling will be good at 14, and it will be good at 10, and it will be good at 8, be good at 7, it’ll be good at 5, but what you tend to find is that 3 or 4 grand range. It can be a bit hit and miss, uh, especially if the fuel’s not good. And, and, uh, you know, now, uh, the way the, uh, somebody like the lab that had me had it before, before me, John or Neil, the lab before that, the Irish road race guy, he, uh, Um, you know, he just ride it very aggressively.

It had no mirrors, on it because, you know, you’re not looking back. You’re riding it. And if you ride it like that, if you come into throttle sharply, if you go through the gears in a sharp way, it was, it was all right. Or at least it was for, um, about the, the, The first year or so the first year or so for for a period when I had it, I felt like it was all right.

But [00:05:00] but there was a moment there where um, I struggled to get the clutch to disengage and my hand was tired and I was Mentally tired and it tried to put me into the middle of an interception a busy like interception. Um, and it Absolutely scared the shit out of me. Um, and I’ve not ridden it for a little bit.

Well, John had the clutch apart and it had all this horrible, milky, oily shit in it. Right. And, and, uh, Anyway, so it’s got a new clutch. Um, it also has not just the new clutch, but it also has a modification, which is well known on the Suzuki forums. Like you, like, you know, it’s, it’s, is you fit a clutch ring from a later Kawasaki ZX10, so in fact, the, the CX10, [00:06:00] the ZX10R C1 2005 bike that I have, uh, The sort of peak analog bike, 180 horse, um, no aids whatsoever, peak analog, peak power.

After that analog, that, um, that bike, the, you fit a clutch ring from that bike to the 2001 Dix a Thou and you get a bike that has a much smoother clutch on it. Now, um, when the clutch first seized up, John was like, well, I was like, how do you fix it? And he went, well, you zip tie and you hold it, you leave it in for a bit and then you see what’s going to happen.

And he and Neil, when John was buying it off, Neil had identified that as a problem and they changed the, the oil. So this milkiness had come in, in the time that I guess, since he and Neil had done it, that’s probably 10 years. Um, and, and, you know, you think [00:07:00] about it, the bike is now 24. Years old, which is, is, is astonishing.

Um, so I actually really, um, uh, so yeah, so John did the oil for me. He did this gearbox, did this clutch change on me and he fitted, did this modification where you fit a clutch ring from a ZX10R to, uh, the, and it makes the, the clutch smoother. He also did a test ride for me, um, leaving me comfortable. Uh, you know, it was going to be all right for, for me to ride it.

So, so that bike, um, now is, is working again. And I’ve satisfied myself that, that John, um, did some work on. What I’ve got to say is my favorite bike, which is the 2005. GSXR 1000 that I paid like 2, 000 for in the days before the, the, the [00:08:00] pandemic. Um, it has, um, an oil leak. Um, I think it probably always had it.

Um, and for a minute thereafter, John did the work on it because the plastic was off and because it was like all down the block. Um, from, because the leak is from right in, in the middle. Um, I did a ride and I came back and there was oil all on my right hand boot. And if it’s all in my boots, all on the fucking tire, isn’t it?

Let’s make no mistake. So, so that, um, put me off that bike a little bit, but I’ve run it up since. And it doesn’t. You know, it leaks a bit, but so does every Norton or, or, you know, BSA you’ve ever seen, haven’t you? So I don’t want to, it would be hypocritical as an Englishman to begrudge a motorcycle a little bit of, of, of an oil leak.

Um, and John, For me earlier in the year had done, um, a full service on, on that bike. I’d identified the leak and tried to, [00:09:00] to, to fix it in some ways. And we, we talked about it, um, and talked about how based upon all the debris and the fairing, probably that it was sort of leaking like that all the, uh, all the time.

Um, I’m sitting here looking at it right now. Um, I went out for a ride on it. Um, so this is the, the, the, my beginning story, which I’ve taken the usual rambling approach up to, um, and I guess I should entitle the story, you know, I, I wrote down was, um, I, I’ve seen God. And he rides a GSXR because I’ve done three motorcycle rides after, you know, the reason I was dribbling on about the dog was the dog occupied all my time and I hadn’t, I hadn’t ridden.

And then in the last three days, I’ve done three rides. The first one was on the, the K5 and [00:10:00] I really, I never, when I go out, I never think to myself, I’m going to ride really fast. I just go out, stretch the motorcycle’s legs. And in this case, well, not even stretch his legs, just, just have a ride. I don’t, you know, I didn’t have, I didn’t even have a, have a route in mind as As I rolled down the hill away from the house, all I wanted to do was make sure there wasn’t oil on my boot.

And I kept on stopping at the light. I kept, I at the first sort of stop sign, I, I, I looked at my, uh, my boot there and there was no oil on it and, and rolling along. Um, the 30 mile an hour speed limit along past the ocean there, I was looking at my boot again and there didn’t seem to be any oil on it.

Well, a miraculous thing happened from my home, um, all the way up the hill towards the highway along past Daly City. Um, all the way along there I got a run [00:11:00] of green lights. Absolute poetry. Absolute poetry. I, I’ve never had a run of green lights like, like that before. Um, I never got out of third gear. The thrust in second and third gear, if you remotely approach the top end of the power band is it, it is, I’ve said it before on the pod and no doubt I’ll say it again, it, it is, it is a motoring experience without parallel, um, There’s never a moment where you’re not where the straights are just shortened, and and the turns become exercises in [00:12:00] balancing that enormous thrust with the how low you feel comfortable with leading the motorcycle and frankly what the surface of, of, of the road looks like in, in, in this particular situation.

I, I, you know, I, I, I really believe this is truly one of the seminal motoring experiences, like the, the thrust, uh, road. motor, motoring experiences, the thrust of, of a four cylinder, uh, Japanese sports bike, uh, along a, along a road like that. And I think, um, You know, does it enhance it that the bikes completely analog.

Um, I don’t think so really, you know, um, John always says to me, you know, I should never ride a BMW s1000rr [00:13:00] because if I did, I would then, you know, never want to ride any of the old bikes that I’ve got because the s1000rr is just perfect. Um, I don’t know. I’ve never ridden one, right? So, uh, so I don’t know.

It would also be a more expensive bike than anything that I’ve bought before, unless I was to buy a really terrible used example. So, uh, So the next day I thought having, you know, I haven’t had that one awesome ride. And I had the same, a similar experience. I just, I just rode away from the house and back again, it was about, you know, 15 miles on maybe road.

Um, and I stepped off feeling absolutely awesome about motorcycles. I was reminded why I’ve, you know, filled my garage and, and fill my, Uh, hobby time, um, with, with the things and, and why I’m doing this jigsaw farm project at the moment to, with, with, with Aaron to, [00:14:00] to try and, you know, make, uh, to try and make them come alive while, you know, make them come alive.

In, you know, to historicize them a little, right? I feel the, the, the stuff that’s written a didactic history, no one’s writing a, like, vernacular history of the sports bike. So perhaps that’s what I’m trying to do with this jigsaw farm project photo. Dunno what it’s gonna be. Comic book. Dunno what it’s gonna be project with, uh, with, with Aaron here.

Um. So yeah, so I, I rode the Gixxer, I rode the K5 Gixxer up the hill and down the hill again and, uh, Was just stupefied by the motoring experience. Um, uh, it, it, uh, however well a car handles, it never handles with the purity [00:15:00] of even a not great motorcycle. And. Suzuki GSX R in any of its iterations handles pretty well and in that K5 iteration really it’s a very easy, comfortable, approachable motorcycle to ride and that makes the The performance feel accessible as, as well.

So as I say, you know, I didn’t go berserk by any means, never got out of third gear. Um, stepped off it feeling absolutely awesome and, and understood why I’d filled the garage with motorcycles. So the next day I was like, well, I’ll ride again. I promised myself that I was going to do some kind of exercise on the peloton and I was like, ah, with the time and there wasn’t going to be time to do both.

And I thought, you know what? I will do both. Instead of [00:16:00] doing the peloton, I’ll ride my pedal bike.

We live on a hill, right? So inevitably, you’re going to have to like do some exercise riding back up the hill. It’s pretty tough. off putting actually, because you know, as you’re riding home, there’s going to be this massive climb right at the end. But at a certain point, you know, you just get used to it as part of the, of the experience.

And also, you know, I’m lazy and unfit, and it shouldn’t be a massive climb to me. It wouldn’t be if I was, uh, if I was reasonably fit. Um, anyway, but when you leave, you get to go down the hill, don’t you? And it’s funny how. I am the, the, on the way down the hill, I say to myself, you know, I said to my wife before I left, you know, I’m going to try and do the hill without any breaks, the hill past the cliff house just near, um, you know, try and do the hill, no breaks.

It’s like [00:17:00] twisty corn, uh,

a shame to say I did have a little dab on the entry. I did my, my, I was, was distracted. I was a motorcyclist and I thought he might have pulled out and I was looking for him to check. And it meant I wasn’t like fully focused on the line. At least that’s my excuse. But I did have a little feather of, uh, of rear brake before I, uh, tipped in properly.

But, uh, but, but yeah, really enjoyed, uh, that bike ride. Of course, that kind of ride. Um. The sensation of speed is intensified by the fact that you are adrenalized, um, with a motorcycle, the, the adrenaline comes in as a, you know, sort of as a result of the [00:18:00] speed, almost rather than, um, uh, the adrenaline.

Driving the speed in the way that it does, um, on, on the pedal bike. Um, a slightly similar experiences though in the, um, I, I, uh, I actually stepped off the jigsaw feeling more satisfied than I did step off the pedal bike because I had, uh, um, I had a moment of, of, uh, where one of my legs didn’t quite work properly and I had to get off the bike and, uh, push for a minute and then I was crossing myself and got back on and, uh, rode on.

But, uh, yeah, um. Anyway, so the next day I got the, so day three, right? Ride number three. I had this, uh, the K1 was, was ready. It now has its ZX10 clutch modification in it. So, uh, I took it up the [00:19:00] hill. as well in the same way like rolled out of the city. I didn’t get quite the same run of, uh, of, of green lights as I did, but I got, uh, I got enough to feel confident the powerful as the K5 is, especially with this, you know, Remus can, and, and so on the, so it’s freer breathing than it used to have.

And it is noticeably punchier, you know, when you, when you, take a shift and come in another gear. It does feel noticeably punchier. And I remember that when I put on my, on my 600, on my K one, on my K one 600, when they put a, when I put a can on that, it does really make it feel a bit punchier, especially second gear.

Like when you go from first to second gear, it weights the. The bike up, uh, the bike up a little bit. Um, I’ve got to say though, I, I feel like picked up, [00:20:00] perked up as the K5 is. I feel like that K1, which I think has race cams or something in it. I’m not really sure. Um, either way, Neil built it himself. So, you know, um, that bike.

It has a vim and a vigour that is just my word. I think that because the tank’s bigger, I think that because the riding position is a bit more uncompromised, I think that because the handling’s not as good, let’s call a spade a spade. You know, it’s a fat tank. bike. So you get that it has, you know, on the K five, if you’re paying attention, you feel like you can adjust the line in the middle of the turn in the, on the K one, there’s not that same feeling.

Um, so that means that if, if you, um, don’t carve between the potholes, right? Yeah. Um,[00:21:00]

really, Um, the, the ride is, is perhaps illustrated by the fact that the, uh, certain point, uh, having thrilled myself, I was like, you know what, I’m going to ride the route that I rode when it scared the shit out of me and see if it’s all right. And you know, it was, it really was. I, I was confident, um, riding it in those, in that situation.

And the only reason I did that was because I, I was already comfortable that the clutch was, was not gonna bite me. It’s, it’s made the K1 as rideable as, as the K5. And you’re saying, well, you mean you contradict yourself there. You didn’t say that. No, what I mean is my first bike was a K1. 600 and, and I find those bikes familiar and easy to use, you know, uh, um, not quite [00:22:00] as easy to use as a GS 500, but, but I, I find them very familiar and comfortable.

The K5 is more developed and is more comfortable than that. If you look at the older bikes that I have, the older GSXRs, they progressively Get more raw and harder, um, to, to use. I, I struggle with the shifts on, on, on a lot of them. I’m embarrassed to, to, to say, well, let’s not dwell on that. Let’s just dwell on the fact that those three rides that I had in the last couple of days were, were really, really exciting.

And, and, uh, when, you know, in, in the decades to come, as, as we reflect, on, on why people ride motorcycles or road motorcycles or why people want to do seemingly dangerous things for no reason other than they’re dangerous just for the, for the [00:23:00] thrill of it. I, I can’t describe the level of spiritual fulfillment I felt from having the courage to be like, I’m going to ride that K1, And then when I didn’t plan to ride the road that where it had scared me, but I did, and it in exact it’s, uh, and I had to sit in traffic in exactly the same spot where I tried to put me into the middle of the intersection under the wheels of, of, you know, a Honda minivan.

And, uh, it was absolutely fine. And, and, and I felt, uh, comfortable with it and, uh, I’m actually keen to, to ride it again. So, uh, Yeah, so, so next let’s fix the Ducati’s leaking clutch. It’s leaked clutch fluid all over the ground. It smells of gas. I assumed it was gas, tried to tighten up a fuel filling, stripped the head off a bolt.

Go me. Go me mechanic extraordinaire. Luckily, um, [00:24:00] it seems that I’m not a great rider, but it seems that I’m an even worse mechanic than I am a rider best, best generates some money in another way, hadn’t I,

I just did a pause there. So old Saxon. Can, uh, can, can endow us because if I’m going to talk about England, right, I have to talk about sax. I have to have Saxon as the, as, as the soundtrack. So let’s, let’s talk about what England is, right? Before I talk about England, let’s talk about how England before the coming of the Romans, it was Britain, right?

Then the Romans came, the Romans went again, and then from all parts of [00:25:00] Scandinavia, the Saxon, different Saxon tribes invaded, creating the Anglo Saxons, as in this term that Americans will be familiar with, white Anglo Saxon, Protestant, yeah, because this is the, the, you know, from England, Scotland, Wales, this, this kind of.

Uh, this, this kind of, of neck of the woods. Um, so what happens to the Anglo Saxon kingdoms? Well, 1066 and all that, the Normans, the French invade. And for a while, Anglo Saxon England is an occupied kingdom by the Normans who speak French and use these newfangled devices that called castles to impose authority on, on the people.

On the Anglo Saxons who speak a completely different language, but then about 300 years later, there’s this fellow Chaucer and he writes the [00:26:00] Canterbury Tales. And in the Canterbury Tales, he weaves together. English and French into what we, what I was taught was called middle English. Um, the language that evolves into Shakespearean English, and then in turn, you know, into the language that, that we, uh, that we’re, that you’re listening to me speak today.

So, um, So that’s what Saxon is, right? That’s the nation of, so, so therefore Saxon, the band who come from Bradford near, near Yorkshire, uh, um, Bradford in Yorkshire, um, they seemed a perfect band to use for, for my, uh, Visit to England and, and for the fact that, uh, a lot of the road trip that I did was, was focused on visiting Neolithic sites of England, like Anglo Saxon, long barrows, like Wayland Smithy, for [00:27:00] example, um, with, uh, my son who’s, who’s nine, just soon to be, uh, soon to be 10.

Um, yeah, so, uh, I guess, uh, Let’s begin, um, at the top of my agenda here. Yes, that’s right. I’ve not even gone to the top of my agenda. That’s right. Um, The rental car that I had. So I had these grand plans. I was going to do a lap of England. I was going to visit a range of Mott Bailey castles with Ollie. I was going to visit some places that I’d not seen before.

I’d spoken to Chop’s garage, garage, Chop’s garage in North Devon there. I was going to buy his black 160, 000 mile Jaguar XFR, XF diesel. Like with 440 foot pounds of torque, I was so excited to buy that car was only [00:28:00] bloody three and a half grand. But then I was like, I’m not going to go for that long. We had the dog.

That was what really did it. We had the dog. So then I wasn’t going to go for that long. And the trip just got much shorter. And I just focused on, on spending time, you know, with, with, with my parents. Cause I was just going to go with, with, with my son. So didn’t need a car, wasn’t going to do much driving, did have for a brief period a car to do these Neolithic sites, just me and, and, and the boy, um, at the rental place when we picked up, I said to the guy, when he said to me, you can have a Vauxhall Mokka, um, I was like, I’m not quite sure.

I wasn’t quite sure why, well, that was talking about, but like, it didn’t sound good, did it, a car named after a coffee it’s like, you know, didn’t sound like, you know, the guy was like that BMW outside that just pulled up. And he says, like I said, it’s badged a [00:29:00] 320 D, but it looked kind of the business. He was like, you could have that.

I was like, how much more is it? And he was about to tell me and I was like, yeah, you know what? Don’t, right? I’ll take the mocha. And the reason I did it is because the mocha is a stick, right? And I knew that I was going to be able to have Ollie do the shifting for me. Um, Which if you think of it, he’s going to sat on the other side.

So it’s actually almost like, like you were driving a stick shift car in, uh, you know, in California where, you know, all cars are left hand drive, if that makes sense. So I thought, you know, that would be, uh, uh, you know, a useful, interesting experience for me because he does this, he does the shifts for me now in the, in the Fiesta.

Um, when we, uh, when we go to school, he’s pretty good at judging, uh, judging where we need to be. So he’s got that important skill that I wanted to teach him, which is instinctively, you know, which gear to put it in. So when you learn to drive properly, you’re just following the [00:30:00] road signs and knowing what gear to put it in and dipping the clutch and bringing it up gently and finding the bike point and all that stuff.

You just already, you know, you already know how

Yeah. So I said no to the BMW. Um, Thereby losing an opportunity to do a follow up. I realized now I did to do a follow up on, I wrote a piece and I’ll link to it about, uh, F ninety three to eight. That I had in Florida, um, for Amelia Island. I went the only time I’ve been to the Amelia Island Concourse. And there was a road in from the freeway to the Amelia Island Concourse.

And it was very quiet when I drove along it. And I confess I did behave like a hooligan. Along that road and was stupefied by how good that BMW was. And up to then, I guess it was just [00:31:00] so long ago. I’d not realized that I needed to get it into sport mode. And the car was just like Jekyll and Hyde. When you put it in sport mode, it was just all kinds of awesome out of it.

In like eco mode. It was like some kind of Camry. It was like really not interesting to me, but I was just going to the show and it didn’t bother me and I didn’t want to get a speeding ticket. But then when I found the sport mode and I had this twisty road, I was like, Oh, Oh, BMW. I love you. Um, so that was the F90.

Um, and I think before then, um, my wife and I did a trip to Northern Spain, uh, where we were in Barcelona and we went to Sitka’s Terramar, the bowl that’s out there, you know, the, the Brooklands like banked racing track that’s, that’s out there. And we had, uh, um, I remember about that as you, about that vacation is Europop and me setting the speedo, uh, the, whatever the kilometers equivalent of 120 miles an [00:32:00] hour was because there was nobody on those roads.

If you ever, if you ever really want to do a motion vacation and you like ham, you like cold ham and you don’t mind the wines a bit rough. If you. Spend enough, the wines were all right. But you know, Spanish wines are always a bit rough, aren’t they? They’re always a bit like, did I just, you know, am I taking store out of my teeth kind of thing?

I just, I just knocked an entire industry that I don’t want to say that. But you, you French, it’s Italian. What it’s, um, Spanish wines always have a bit of a rough D aftertaste, don’t they? Well, they don’t always, I’m going to stop saying this. I can just edit out how I’ve abused the whole Spanish wine industry that I currently, um, but no, my point is if you like ham And salami and that kind of thing.

This is a great place to travel. If you like driving fast, the highways, the toll roads, I guess nobody uses them. They, all the locals use the other roads and the toll roads. I was the only person on them and it was, it was awesome. Um, [00:33:00] Europop. Anyway, so that was a good car as well. That, that, that, I think that was the previous generation we had.

So anyway, so out of the opportunity to do like an update on, on a BMW three series Euro spec, like, you know, Basie three series, um, must spend that opportunity so while he could do the shifting, um, all right, so I’m going to make sure that dog’s all right. Oh, he certainly is. He’s right there behind me. I was just going to go and look for him and he’s right there behind me.

That’s perfect. Um,

Yeah, so I’ve got this Mokka, it was white, it had these red trim pieces on it and I mean they hurt my eyes basically. Um, it was nice inside, um, and, and my immediate [00:34:00] impression like in the first like hour of using it was that the motor was kind of gruff, but pretty pokey. And I think, um, I mean, it did, it’s a few or miser, but then everything seems like that to me in comparison to the stuff that I drive in the States.

So, you know, the BMW does like 16 around town. I mean, it’s, it’s really, uh, uh, pretty outrageous. The stuff that we’re having, the stuff that the people have in Europe. So, um. I mean, I look at the specs. I thought I kept on saying to Wally and it was one of me. This is what I mean. I thought about fuel economy because you have to fill it up right until the end of the trip.

And when we did fill it up right as we’re pulling into the gas station, said to him, do you think it’s a gas or diesel? Because when you started it up, it was rough like a diesel. Um, But it was pokier than a diesel, but it was obviously turbocharged. You could feel it at the same kind of like come [00:35:00] in low and deliver super linear power, the modern turbos have like my Fiesta ST has.

So it’s that, that, um, feel about it. Um, the way, but, but you know, no, it was gas, right? So I reckon it has to have been a triple. So what I wrote down here was gruff, but pokey. Um, The other thing I liked about it, and this is a crazy thing, and I wonder if it’s a conscious thing, but you remember the Vauxhall Viva HB, the second one, the one that had like the Coke bottle waistline, um, like the Escort Mk1?

Didn’t that car have a like a ripple down the middle of the hood? Um. I feel like having that ripple down the middle of the hood, which the, the Mokka has, I feel like that’s a sort of Voxel [00:36:00] styling piece. And, and that I thought was, there’s like a, you know, there’s like a ripple. A ridge down the middle of the hood and that gave it from the seating position quite a nice view.

Now, if I think of it now, I didn’t spend a lot of time looking at the car because I didn’t like the exterior of it particularly. But whilst I’m on the subject of the exterior of it, we stayed at a pub that overlooked the Uffington White Halls. So we’re outside this pub and I noticed the second morning when we were having breakfast, I’m literally, you can see the white horse over the boy’s shoulder as he’s eating his like bacon and eggs.

I, I, I realized as like the oven white horse is like at 12 o’clock and if I look to like three o’clock I can see a blue plaque on one of the houses across the street. Well as we were driving out of the town I had to look at who it was. John Betjeman. John [00:37:00] Betjeman poet laureate lived there. Awesome.

Obviously, Poet Laureate, appointed by the Queen, would have a house that looked out onto the Uffington White Horse across the English South Downs. And I really do love that part of England. Anyway, so, uh, the night before, I realized we were right by Benjamin’s house. Um, we, uh, Fox and Hounds is the name of the pub.

I can really recommend it. Um, uh, we, uh, Uh, as Ollie and I were popping out to, uh, uh, visit the white horse. Cause like, you’ll get those lovely long evenings, English, summer nights, high California, it gets dark sooner and it gets cold. It doesn’t happen like that in England. It retains the heat. So we like, we didn’t get to the, we didn’t check into like five, six o’clock, something like that, but we had a drink and then popped straight out.

Well, as we were like popping out to look at the white horse and get something to [00:38:00] read, um, This couple who I have in a beer were like, Oh, what cars that we like that car? I was like, well, it’s not mine. I’ll tell you that. And they were like, Oh, we like it. It’s a, I was like, well, you know, it’s a Vauxhall Mokka.

I said to them. So, yeah. So look, I didn’t like it, but other people did is, is my point. And what I did like, as I say, was how it drove. I mean, I’ve complained about, you know, it sounding a little bit diesely and so on, but you know, let’s be honest about that. I didn’t give a shit about that. Really? It, when you asked it to go, it had enough.

I didn’t find it lacking. I didn’t find the handling irritating. I found the, the, I could place it exactly where I, I needed it to be. Now, I should say at this point, this is the second trip that I’ve done to England, where I’ve told the GPS to keep me on. Off main highways. So I’ve just stayed off the motorways and I’ve done everything on, on a roads.[00:39:00]

And what that means is you really do see England’s green and pleasant land, but my word, the towns are snarled up now. So you have to be in like a mellow mood and ready to jam through the towns. And, and, you know, when you’re jamming through Cotswold towns and talking about Cotswold stone, and then, you know, you’re watching, we’re watching a TV show about idyllic bucolic England, and it’s the Cotswolds and it’s, you know, exactly the town that Ollie and I were driving through, you’re like, all right, you know, I do know something about how to, to provide, you know, A decent travel experience for myself and for people who were who were along for the ride, both literally and metaphorically and also right not for nothing.

I don’t want to stop in some motorway services and eat a Burger King when I can stop at a fish and chip shop. Or in a pub and have, yes, equally unhealthy, but far more tasty and [00:40:00] different food and couch it all in the terms of cultural experience for, uh, for myself. Well, it is a cultural experience. I mean, all the pubs we’re going into, they’re older than the whole of California, aren’t they?

That kind of blew Ollie’s mind that the pub that we went in, he said, 1845. I was like, yeah, five years before the gold rush. And he was like, Whoa, like eyes popping out of his head. Um,

So, yeah, so this Mokka, we had it down these little lanes all the time, right? And, and even on these lanes, um, it was fine to be placed. You know, it was a lot better than my Mustang would, would have been, you know, because the Mustang with that live rear axle, if the surface is bad on a B road, oh, my word, it’s, it’s terrible.

And if the road’s damp. Well, this mocker was fine. Is it? Is it, was it as delightful as a Fiesta T? No. Was it a lot closer than I would’ve [00:41:00] anticipated it being? Yeah. So I guess this is a roundabout way of saying that I was actually all right with the car and I think I was, although I am glossing over. A couple of really irritating things about it.

And let me go there with them now. So once I was saying goodbye to my parents, um, we get in the suitcases in the car and so on. I put one suitcase in and then close the boot trunk, boot trunk, boot boot trunk. Hit the clicky button to open it. Wouldn’t open, couldn’t open the trunk. Pressing it, pressing it, couldn’t open it.

Ended up opening up the folding seats and joking with my dad about the standard 8. That we’ve been looking at because apparently one of the differences between the standard eight and the standard 10 wasn’t just the two horsepower extra that you got. It was the on the [00:42:00] 10. You got a proper opening boot lid on the standard eight.

It had a trunk shape there, but the actual boot, the trunk part, there was no trunk lid. It didn’t open. You could only access it by folding down the seats. So we had a good chuckle about that. And I got the, uh, the other seat belts in, but I should say, it just amused me that the, as I was struggling to do it and pushing the buttons and swearing at it, uh, my mother, Immediately laughed.

Um, and I’m like, yeah, absolutely. That’s completely the right way to react to it because it diffused my frustration. Um, with the whole situation, uh, immediately that by ineptitude with modern technology that I can make the car a lot properly now it did get into that kind of pattern before. I think what you needed to do was like do the lock and the unlock again.

And then it would like, I do the trunk or something like that. The [00:43:00] point is the. That um Very complicated, you know, all it needed was a button, you know, I really, there wasn’t actually that much wrong with the, you know, the key that you put in the lock and turned and, you know, pop the trunk, um, that it utterly defeated me, whatever advantages it offers that it utterly defeated me, not once, but twice.

Seems to be pretty poor design, doesn’t it? I mean, I know, um, I’m inept, but I, I still, yeah, I, I’m just bemused by it as a piece of design. Now, the other thing that it did, and this was just, gobsmacking to me is, is when you went five miles an hour over the speed limit, it chimed at you [00:44:00] like an American seatbelt chime, you know, not like a, eh, eh, eh, just like a bong, bong, bong.

Like I’m there. I’m annoying. I’m like, I’m dragging at your, I’m not nipping at your ankle in a meaningful way. I’m just like dragging at you. Like I’m like a piece of, until eventually you’re gonna, I mean, Now, Ollie found a way to defeat it. There was like a menu and you could defeat it whenever we got in.

But whenever you turn the ignition off, when you restarted the car, it came back in again. I, I mean, I mean, I, I just, just, I just, just, I mean, it was only 20 years ago when that GSXR 1000 K5 that I’m looking at came out, a bike that can do [00:45:00] 102 miles an hour in first gear.

Now I know that nobody needs a motorcycle that can do that, a road machine on the road, I know, responsible, blah. But, tell me how it can be a step forward to go from something as glorious as that, as something that made me feel as sublime as that. How can it be a step forward to go from that to bong, bong, I’m sorry Dave, I can’t let you do that, I’m sorry Dave, I can’t let you do that.

Like, no. No, burn it down. Smash the machines. Smash the machines. I say smash this. This is Bo and Luke Duke. They fight the system. Any system. The boy wanted to go back to the [00:46:00] National Motor Museum at Bewley. We went. Last summer, it’s near where my parents live. Um, I was an intern there. That’s really, I mean, I wasn’t what I called it in period, but, um, you know, so I worked there, what, 30 years ago now, nearly, um.

They really do a very, very good job at fulfilling the mission, which is to tell the story of motoring in Britain. So that’s partly the story of the Bewley family, the Montague family, who were motoring pioneers. And, but it, but it’s also to have, Examples of cars like the Hillman Imp, so we can tell the story of, you know, Linwood and, you know, industrial decline and, and, and all of that.

So, um, you know, I, I, I thought that it was a significant [00:47:00] and needed development that Ari Vatanen’s. Rothman’s Escort Rally Car, an iconic car for my generation and people older than me had moved amongst the rally cars deep into the collection. And in the foyer, its place was taken by a pristine Sierra Cosworth RS500.

Something which has resonance for people 20 years younger than me, not just people. My age and 20 years older and I’m, I’m 50. Um, the thing that the National Motor Museum really tells a great story on is, is the land speed record cars. Um, so that’s some of Malcolm Campbell’s Bluebirds. It’s my, you know, I would say all time favorite motor vehicle.

[00:48:00] Um, the Napier Irving. Special the golden arrow first car to 240 miles an hour. And, uh, I also love the, the, the slug, the red thousand horse per sunbeam that Seagrave took to 200 miles an hour in, in 1927. Now that car is undergoing a complete restoration and it is stripped to the bone and. I spent probably a good 45 minutes just watching the videos and looking at the progress that they’ve made and, and just amazed that this, you know, tack welded thing could house these two 22 and a half liter, 400 horsepower aero engines.

You know, it just. boggles the mind and there’s, you know, uh, what looks like a, uh, you know, uh, uh, [00:49:00] uh, a seat from, uh, you know, uh, that you’d sit on at the beach, um, you know, with no seatbelts or anything like that in between these two giant roaring engines. Um, yeah, awesome. So, uh, so they’ve made good progress with that.

And, and I wanted to mention the, the thousand horsepower sunbeam because, um, They’re looking for, for people to, to make donations. And really, if, if you listen to this podcast and if you’ve ever been amused by any stories I’ve ever told, you know, it’s don’t buy my merch, such as it is. Go. He was in, not that I’ve even created any yet.

Don’t. Give money to the national motor museum so they can do this project to get not just one, but both engines rebuilt and running again, and the car back to Daytona beach for 1924, the centenary in 2027. Um, yeah, uh, they had a [00:50:00] really great exhibit looking in detail. Um, it was to do with, it was some photographer, but it was the detail.

It was, he had done detailed photography and then it was telling the story of the, of the various objects and it was, uh, objects around, um, Seagrave’s Golden Arrow.

Really, I spent the, um, I, I really immersed myself in that part of the museum and I realized that the museum does a very good job at delivering the kind of, of level of, you know, I’ll pot around and I’ll look the, that works for most people, the kind of, you know, information that is right to make my son really passionate about the cars that the he likes.

Um, he dragged my mother around and, and talked endlessly at granny about cars, which must have been a little bit of deja vu for granny. I would, uh, I would [00:51:00] have said, um, but yeah, when they went outside to do the adventure playground and the zipline, I just fell down this hole of this exhibit around golden arrow and, and, uh, people around it.

I didn’t know much about Captain Irvine, the guy that designed it. I knew nothing about Seagray’s wife before, so there was a lot of, of color around that. And I really just wanted to say bravo to, to the team at the National Motion Museum for delivering that kind of, of, of in depth experience. If you, if you want to go deep, The depth is, is, is really, is really there as well as if you want to just, you know, pot around and be like, Ooh, I remember when the XJRs won Le Mans, uh, the silk cut Jags, I remember them.

Um, you know, if that’s the level you want to be at, they have that. If you’re like, I remember San Ismael bro McLaren. Yeah. Right. Cool. Yeah. But also, you know, they have a Porsche 917. Was and you know, it’s a German car. What’s [00:52:00] that doing in the British motor museum? Well, it was a British team, wasn’t it? JW automotive with the Gulf sponsorship, British team.

Um, so that’s why the, uh, the cars there, they have a good story, um, on motorcycles. They have a really wonderful rudge from the thirties race bike. Um, They do a good story, you know, enough for most people of, you know, story of the British motor industry, motorcycle, you know, industry. Um, they also do a piece about motorcycling in the nineties and they have a Suzuki GSXR.

And, um, I was astonished that the bike was there last time. It’s of course a slabby, um, in Suzuki race colors. Um, I was astonished that the bike was there before and, and was so astonished that the GSX R was there and so amused that the plinth, uh, [00:53:00] refers to the bike as a real hooligan machine that I, I was just completely spitting with that.

I almost didn’t look at the bike properly. Well, of course, since then, I’ve added a slabby to the, to the collection here. And, and my bike, pardon me, which was John’s bike, um, was. Owned previously by a guy who raced them and this bike was his spare. So it was race prepared. It’s been safety wide and all that, but it is, you know, when they talk about, oh, it’s a clean bike.

Um, I was thinking, well, the devil does that actually mean? Does he mean he’s physically clean or not? This bike is. Absolutely a clean bike. Yes, it’s physically clean, but you can just see that all the parts are original. You know, none of the screw heads have been buggered. None of the, uh, you know, it’s just absolutely together as you would expect somebody who intended to race it would would make it.

Now, I guess, um, [00:54:00] Part of the fairing got scratched and it’s been done completely and he had it completely redone in in blue so maybe you know maybe it was down maybe he redid the work on it i’m not really i’m not really sure but the point is that as it sits now my bike Is a nicer example of a first generation Suzuki GSX R than they have in the National Motor Museum.

I’m happy to share it with them, I would say, although I don’t think they’d want it because it doesn’t have that iconic Suzuki race plastic on it. If it had those colors on it, it’s a museum piece, but in some ways I’m glad that it doesn’t because I actually want to ride it a little bit, but that was a revelation and really cool for me that, uh, you know.

My bike’s better than the one in the National Motor Museum.[00:55:00]

So up in the Midlands, there’s that museum that they used to call Gaden. And I think now they call it the British Motor Museum, which is rather confusing, National Motor Museum and British Motor Museum, but, um, all the time it was, you know, I just thought it was Austin and Morris. I was a bit like, blah, that’s going to be depressing.

I don’t want to look at Maestros and Montegos. Um, You know, and read again about how the Allegro’s Cortex steering wheel wasn’t really such a bad idea. Like, just no. Um, that’s how I used to feel about that museum. But then the Jaguar Daimler Heritage Trust moved there. And if there’s one British mark I really love, it’s Jaguar.

Then just recently, I mean, I’ve never been that hot on Triumph motorcycle. But just recently I’ve begun to think about triumph and, and I guess my father had a friend who had, um, triumph 2000s where he had a, a tribe 2000. Then he had a couple of, of 2. [00:56:00] 5 P I, and then he had a 2. 5 S I think as, as, as well, um, I was remember the, the 2000, it was a mark one, it was white, it was rusty, it had a red leather interior.

changed my mind forever about how cool a car could could be. I just absolutely loved just the whole smell and feel of that old triumph. And remembering that car as I got older, I began to feel well, I should revisit triumph as the cast because my son loves the GT six and and, uh, You know, a number of them came here and, and, you know, they’re affordable, doable kind of proposition here.

So I was thinking, wow, would I do a GT six? Um, you know, I definitely would love to do a, a 2000, that mechanical fuel injection. Just think that’s the coolest thing. Um, I should prefer the mark ones and mark twos would love if I was like, you know, if I was Ross [00:57:00] I’d have a Early PI, um, in my, uh, in my collection for sure.

So, so it was with that in mind that I wanted to go to the, uh, to the, to the British motor museum, went around with my dad and with my son, um, really, really good experience. You know, my son’s super passionate about the Jaguar Formula one cars. Um, I remember, you forget how many Riley’s and Alvis’s there were that had really.

rakish bodies put on them. And I think that was what I, I took away. I, I did some real, I took some good photos, which of course I’ve not looked at preparing for this. Like, why, why would you, um, look, I’ve even put on the notepad here, look at my photos before talking. Imagine that,[00:58:00]

you know, I, I mentioned before how, You tend to feel it’s like death by Austin and Morris and, you know, I never was an Austin and Morris guy. I was always a, uh, um, you know, outside lane, you know, hot rod Ford or, or BMW or, you know, or Jaguar, I always feel like if you cast me back to the 1970s or the 1960s, and we’re like, and you know, what would I, what would I have and drive, it would be old Jaguars.

Um, And probably some Fords and maybe some Alfa Romeos and maybe even some Lancias, but definitely old Jaguars. Um, And it’s funny, I mentioned earlier I was going to have a look at my photos and by the miracle of modern technology, that’s what I’ve done here. Um, and almost every photo I took at the [00:59:00] museum, and in fact at the Leamington Spa car show that we went to was as well, um, is of a Jaguar.

So, um, some of the Formula One car, some of the Formula One car’s engine with Ollie admiring the welding, um, some of an XFR that was Jaguar’s fastest saloon car or fastest Jaguar ever or something. I can’t remember exactly how fast it went, but either way, it was a bog standard XFR mechanically that they just did.

Up for, uh, you know, like blanked off the grill and lowered the suspension and all of that kind of style. Include a picture of the car looked awesome. I’ll include the photo of the plinth as well. Um,

you could overlook the workshops where they were doing, you know, where they had a couple of the, um, Jaguar sports cars, you know, from the group C era around that they were doing some work on. And so it was cool [01:00:00] being able to, to overlook that. Um, The Leamington spark, but the Leamington spark car show was an altogether really cool, um, British, uh, you know, Sunday afternoon kind of experience.

Um, Yeah, I went with my whole family. Um, there was a little museum that my mom and, and sister walked round while, um, Ollie and, and my dad and I potted round the field and looked at the cars. I would say a remarkable number of American cars nowadays. And of course. Uh, uh, British car meets in general and often not really very good examples.

Sadly, often like not great examples that have been sort of gussied up at a not very tasteful way. Um, But maybe that’s the case with most car shows and I shouldn’t be a hater. I should be a [01:01:00] lover and, and, you know, um, there was a really nice B Body Charger, um, 68, I think it was. Um, yeah, it was a 68, wasn’t it?

Um, air primer gray, um, that, you know, was stanced right and, and look, look good. And I guess I, I do like the fact that British people don’t worry too much if it’s like great under hood or if the paint’s perfect, you know, you can take it to a show, um, really whatever condition the, uh, really whatever condition the car’s in.

Um, I photographed three cars at the an Audi and two Jaguars. Um, the Jaguar. E type because I’ve really kind of fallen in love with, with E types. Uh, uh, fresh, I, I, I feel, um, I would love to have an E type at some point. It would have to be a series one. Um, and to have to be in that, that patinated [01:02:00] condition.

I think if I’m going to do a British car, you need to, you know, I talked about liking Triumph GT6s, well I do, but you know, the E types, the, the sort of pinnacle of, of, uh, of that. So the British motor museum, looking at the Jaguars made me feel that. And then, um, you know, and learning the story of William Lyons made, made me feel that.

And then the following day at the car show, as I say, I photographed two cars. Um, well, this, this Audi coupe that we’ll talk about in a minute, but, uh, this beautiful E type. British Racing Green, and also a really lovely, um, XK120, um, that would have been my car of the show. It was just a lovely, original, patinated example.

I’ll include some photos. Um, so yeah, so, You know, in the Jaguar Daimler heritage trust, it talked about William Lyons, um, age 21, buying a motorcycle [01:03:00] sidecar and then decided he wanted to go into partnership with a guy who’d built it for him. So it’s the beginning of swallow sidecars, but because he was under 21, he needed his parents to sign for him so he could like set up and do the business and the.

plaque in, in the Jaguar Dame Heritage Trust at the British Mining Museum. It has this wonderful line in it, um, about how this displayed lions early. This, this displayed his, the, this, this, you know, this was an early demonstration of the aptitude that would, which of the, uh, you know, the two skills that would serve him so well later in his career, his eye for style and his business acumen.

What they wrote was much slicker than what I just said, but the point is that Jaguar is the eye for style and business acumen. That’s why, that’s why they survived. And, and also they understood that thing. Jaguar, um, [01:04:00] in the classic period and William Lyons understood that thing that, um, Luca de Montezemolo talked about.

And it is misogynistic. It’s, you see a beautiful woman across the room. Ah, you invite her out to dinner. You have dinner with her. If she’s not that If the conversation is not all that, if she is a little boring, if she is not intelligent, you know, suddenly she’s not so attractive, is she? Whereas if, when you drive the car, it has this incredible performance as well.

Oh, then at that point, Really, you know, if the car, if, if, if the drive impresses you as much as looking at her across the room did when you first saw her, you know, it has to be the duality of, of experience. That was the point that, that DeMonta Zemelow was, uh, was, was making. And, and, um, that’s the point that William Lyons understood and is perfectly demonstrated in the E type was it looked awesome, [01:05:00] by God, it was fast too.

And I think, you know, my. Bullet Mustang is 265 horse. So did those early E types and, and really, you know, that’s going to make them feel sprightly, not fast by modern standards, but, you know, sprightly enough for me, especially on those, uh, on those narrow tires, the Audi, um, early 100 coupe. There were actually two at the show and I don’t know whenever.

I was thinking to myself the last time these two were together was, you know, probably when they came off the ferry, right? All those years ago, 1969, 1970. Um, I mentioned the car cause my grandfather had one. And the interesting thing is, is the car I photographed is ice blue. And I thought that that was the color that his was my dad was like no it was navy blue and it’s funny how over the years I’d somehow forgotten um there’s a single photograph of I don’t remember the car itself but yeah that car was a 1970s so you’d have had it not [01:06:00] long before uh before I was born I may have even had Um, you know, crossed over it because I was born right at the end of, uh, end of 73.

Um, so yeah, so two of these Audi 100 coupes, really quite elegant cars, worth googling around on a little bit if you, uh, if, if, you know, my dad told me that, uh, his mom never liked it. And that’s why, um, my grandfather ultimately had, uh, gotten rid of it. I don’t know why she didn’t like it. I should have asked my dad, shouldn’t I?

So the other museum that we went to was the Brooklyn’s museum. I know the museum quite well. I was a member of the Brooklyn Society for a decade or so before I, before I left England, actually for a few years afterwards. And then the [01:07:00] Brooklyn Society, which is the people who tried to preserve the track, merged with the museum and it was acrimonious.

And I can’t remember exactly what the outcome was, but anyway, all of that’s in the rear view now. They have a really great setup now. And, and, uh, um, You know, mostly thanks to the fact that Mercedes bought most of the land and and therefore what Brooklyn’s is is an adjunct to a sort of Mercedes driving experience and a really rather a nice hotel that I’ll put a link in that if you’re flying in and out of Heathrow is super, super convenient and I urge you to stay out whether or not you like cars.

It’s it’s nice. If you like cars, it’s a must stay. My son and I didn’t stay there because I booked too late and it was and it was busy. Booked up. So now when you go to Brooklyn’s, it’s always a company to the sound of an AMG turbo muffled V8 turbo raw, um, as you, cause when you park up the, uh, they’re coming up and down, they’re driving up and down the test track there, you know, all [01:08:00] the, uh, all the people having their AMG driving days.

So, um, for my son, the standout of, of, of Brooklyn’s was that, uh, in the Formula One shed, they have, uh, they have a couple of McLarens. Um, they have one that is, uh, um, I think Lewis Hamilton’s 2008 show car. Um, anyway, my son was too low. To, uh, fit in, but I asked could he, ’cause it was a quiet day, could he sit in?

And the guy said, well, if he can see over the steering wheel, he can have a go. And he, what it is, is a simulated lap of Brooklyn’s, but in Hamilton’s Formula one car, 2008, McLaren, Mercedes, you know, 900 horsepower Formula one car, downforce. Right. And, and, but you know, he’s going, I can see the guy thinking [01:09:00] this kid’s going to be absolutely hopeless, but Ollie listens really well and is able to get out of the pits, even though it’s like a difficult negotiation out of the pits, because it’s the real Brooklyn’s pit.

So you have to go left and then left up onto the, the top of, uh, you know, the narrow end of the, of the egg, if you think of the shape of, uh, of, of Brooklyn’s anyway, um, After a sort of sighting lap where it wasn’t clear to me or the guy if, if Ollie, um, could get his foot right the way down on the throttle or, or quite what was happening, um, a mere 138 miles an hour.

He then got the hammer down properly and was lapping at more than 200 miles an hour using, um, the Vickers sheds as the clipping point, you know, on the side of the egg that has the, the dent on it anyway. So he had one go, then we walked around the museum, then he. Begged me to have another go at another guy got the guy to explain in the line to him did exactly what the guy [01:10:00] told him to do and, uh, probably set fastest lap, um, maybe of the day, but probably, um, you know, for however long, I think it’ll be quite a hard lap to beat because it seemed to be completely, uh, completely online.

So we will, uh, So yeah, so my son was very proud at setting that lap and it was a surreal experience for me to realize that he now knows Brooklyn’s better than I do because he’s actually driven Brooklyn’s in a way that, uh, in a way that I, I haven’t. Um, now my photos of Brooklyn’s are all of the racing motorcycles because really, um, when I go there now, that’s the, the, the experience that I have and I’m going to include a photo of one bike, which, uh, Is just what is so delicious about automotive history in, in, in general, that this bike, um, new was, was raced at the track before the war.[01:11:00]

And then during the war was ridden by an employee at Vickers, um, the aircraft factory that’s at Brooklyn’s because Brooklyn’s is the home of. British aviation as well. So when there wasn’t motor racing there, there was aviation there. And of course, in the war aviation meant, you know, building war planes and the pace of development was just incredible.

And anyway, this guy got to, and from the, uh, got to and from his job at the Vickers aircraft factory on this ex Brooklyn’s race bike, a Norton. Well, after the war, it passes to one Dennis Sergeant Jenkinson. That is to say the DSJ of motorsport fame. Um, well, I mean, for me, uh, as a teenager in, in suburban Plymouth, reading Dennis Jenkinson’s stories about, you know, driving across, uh, France in his E Type, um, going from one Grand [01:12:00] Prix to another, and, and, you know, that was, I was like, that is the lifestyle I want to lead.

vividly, uh, thinking that and really fixing that, uh, in, in, in my mind, I’ve been moderately successful at that, I suppose. Um, but yeah, this was the, the, the, the vision to be, uh, to be Dennis Jenkinson. Um, so that bike, to be a Norton, a race Norton, a race Norton with Brooklyn’s history with a contiguous history of this, you know, wartime usage and then DSJ just what an awesome piece.

And that’s really, you know, what they have at Brooklyn’s, you know, just summed up really, really, really well. I’ll include some photos of a Bentley they have. I happen to believe the body on this Bentley is about the most elegant that I’ve, I’ve seen. Um, Uh, the, the boy and I also did this awesome Concord experience that [01:13:00] he was, was really keen for where, um, this guy told us all about Concord and we went round and we sat on it and did like a simulated sort of takeoff and, and, um, It really was a fun experience.

I mean, you need to, you know, it’s like a piece of theater. You need to immerse yourself in it a little bit because of course the plane sitting on the runway is not taking off. But really you’re left with, with this sense, um, of, of once there was a sense of can do and these amazing things were achieved and, and we, we seem to be, you know, worried about our mental health now instead.

And I, I don’t know. I mean, What was very striking to, um, to me was a point that the guy made is that when you look at the Avro biplane, you know, the, the flew from here in 1908 [01:14:00] or 1911 or whatever it was right at the dawn of flight, the gap between that plane and Concorde is less than the gap between Concorde first flying.

In 1969 and where we are now. And that really makes you think about how, um, to use the, the words of, of our former president Obama. Um, Progress is not linear. Um, and that really illustrates it, doesn’t it? So it’s a Concord is this odd combination of this sort of very old fashion, 1960s, like you’ve seen it in a Jane in a Sean Connery, James Bond movie kind of technology, but all like wrapped up in this like stupefying, like, you know, Mac two with the hull with [01:15:00] a.

Fuselage of the plane being hot enough to melt an egg on and then you’re in New York in three hours I mean, the, the lifestyle implications of it are incredible and, and they have a display in, in the plane itself of all the different airlines that expressed interest in it, and there were a dozen airlines that expressed an interest in, in buying them.

Um, but I guess Boeing. Well, so shit scared that they were going to be eaten alive, that they created the environmental lobby in the U. S. who were like, blah, noise. Um, if you think of it really is, is Concorde, yeah, is noisy, but is there any noisier than A 747. I mean, not really, right? It was mostly about Boeing, um, being, uh, uh, terrified of, of the lead that the Europeans had developed, I think.

So, [01:16:00] so that was, was a narrative I’d never heard before. And I, it was just convincing because this cabinet was full of Every, you know, great airline you can think of from that period, he’d expressed an interest in Concord and even put down deposits and then the environmental lobby in the US shut them down.

And then eventually they were only able to fly into New York and they just really were able to asphyxiate the whole project. And it’s really, um, Really a tragedy. It’s, it’s really, you know, there’s the British motorcycle industry. It’s, it’s British Leyland. It’s, it’s really a tragic story. And I guess I’d never engaged with it in, in period.

I mean, I just wrote the Suzuki GSX, I guess, exiles and was like, I just didn’t care about the British motorcycle industry had gone by the time that I, um, Was learning to ride and I’ve only really investigated it, you know, recently. And, and I should, you know, should say like share an anecdote, you know, the [01:17:00] last time I went to Birmingham, I did my thing where I picked out various projects and I wanted to go and investigate it.

Um, there was this wonderful motorcycle called a Montgomery. Um, I’ll include the photo of it that they had at the national. motorcycle museum in Birmingham. I went to the place where it was built. It’s a terraced house now. I’ll, I’ll do a street view link to it. Um, that, so that was, Kind of mind blowing. Um, there’s one of those places where the neighbors are all, you know, looking out the window, being like, well, what fuck you doing, mister, um, at you turning around your, you know, rental car, which although it’s a base level rental car is still by far the nicest car on the street kind of, uh, kind of thing.

So that was, uh, that was that experience. Um, but that day I also drove to BSA’s factory. And if you look at any of the, you know, photos of the, uh, The BSA factory, there’s a street and the sign that says, uh, that says BSA. So I went there now and, and I went there, [01:18:00] um, I don’t know how many years ago, but anyway, when I was there, what the BSA factory or part of the BSA factory was being used for was by, uh, by one of these businesses that sort of, um, customizes AMG Mercedes, like, you know, puts the, um, you know, the, the, the, that extra bling that works for a certain demographic, um, but is more than the German designers were ever going to do.

This is a shop that does just that. And I thought, wow, is that is, is what’s happened to, uh, to the BSA factory and it, and it, and it really is. So, um, yeah, so I, I didn’t, um, I didn’t really, that was the first time I’d really engaged with British motorcycle history. Of course, um, British automotive history, I mentioned that, you know, I, I, I was put off the, uh, the British Motor Museum because, you know, I didn’t want it to be, I wasn’t interested in paying homage to, uh, um, you know, Austin and, [01:19:00] and Austin’s and Morris’s.

Um, You know, I, I, I wasn’t, and it’s interesting, that’s what I said. I thought it was interesting that, that in the foyer they had a Capri three liter, uh, and a Granada 2.8. And, um, the, the, I live in America now and, and just how this is Junior America is very, very obvious now. It wasn’t obvious to me in period.

I just thought they were cool cars. I didn’t see the whole like. aping Americana, um, that’s so obvious. It’s crazy that I didn’t looking back. Um, but I didn’t. Um, yeah, you know, what makes the Mustang great made the Capri great. Um, and the formula, the Ford had where you did a bit of flash and a lot in terms of, you know, either performance or, um, you know, [01:20:00] Valor and foe and Valor and real wood trim.

I mean, my, my Cortina Crusader had real. Wood trim in it and was a really comfortable car. I mean, that was the thing about, um, Cortinas. They really were comfortable places to be. And then the Granada with that V6 motor was, you know, with a five speed manual that was, was, you know, uh, uh, in period and meaningfully fast car.

Although I should say, and I. Mentioned on the pod before, I feel like, you know, the Jaguar mark two was, was overlooked. I should say, yes, it was a meaningful free fast car. It was, uh, you know, 160 horsepower and it could do 120 miles an hour when most cars could struggle to a hundred miles an hour. So yes, it was a, a fast car Capri 2.

8. Similarly, if you think of, of stuff like. You know, Escort XR3, XR3i, this is like as a hundred or a hundred. And, you know, I remember my dad’s Sierra two liter I was 115 horsepower. So, you know, this is, is [01:21:00] low. Uh, this is, you know, low horsepower in comparison to Jaguars, because right from the era of the Mark II.

With the three eight, these are 200 plus horsepower cars. Um, 130 mile an hour cars really, uh, Jags were the fastest thing you could buy. If you put me back in time and we’re like cheap and fast, what would you do? I’d be. In the classifieds, finding a manual transmission Jaguar. The cleanest, big capacity, manual transmission Jaguar I could, I, I could find.

Morning, we’re entering Brooklands. [01:22:00] Ah, yeah. Got up and was persuaded by the boy to go out for breakfast rather than just eat straight away. And uh, we found a breakfast place but then it turned out it was a hotel and by that time it was half past 11 and I was just like, you know, I remember why I just fucking hated Guildford.

I just remember why I hated Guildford. And we got out on the highway and I guess that piece of the M3 now is all like this 50 mile an hour like average speed check and I’m just like, wow. Wow. Wow. So there was this band, the Mack Lads, very, very offensive. I mean, only, you know, gangster rappers. Snoop Dogg came close to the level of offensiveness that the Mack Lads achieved, but with more poetry, Snoop Dogg than the Mack Lads were just really, really offensive.

They did one song. The chorus of it was what the fook, fook, fook have they done to an I [01:23:00] really feel like that about parts of England with these average speed limits and nowhere more than that top of the M3 where it joins the M25 because man, those that I know that piece of road really well. And, and, you know, I used to, I mean, I’m not going to name the speeds that I used to come up there in, in company stuff that I used to have that kind of time.

And, and the, the. Slip roads. They’re now single lane. They used to be two lane. And, and so you used to be able to really have a enjoyable experience. If you were coming off the M25 and going onto the M3, it was a lovely, you know, it was, it was a bit like the, the left, right. sharp right at the end of the long straight at the Nürburgring.

It was like you could come off the motorway, come off the M25 and it was like an elbow left and then a sharper [01:24:00] right. Um, and you needed to get some braking done anyway, um, in the Vectra. that I had at the time. The Vectra was like an understeery monster through, through that, uh, through that long sweep.

Well, now it’s all like 50 miles an hour. Like, I feel like what the fuck, fuck, fuck have they done to me, pup? I really, the hogsback, the hogsback, the piece of road that Mike Hawthorne raced along to his death in his Jaguar doing 130 miles an hour. Average speed check. Average speed check of 50 miles an hour.

The problem is everyone does it, so you just, everyone’s driving along next to each other at 50 miles an hour. I mean, I, I don’t live there anymore. Um, you know, I, I can take a speeding ticket, can’t I? So I’m not saying I necessarily speed it, but what I’m saying is if I get a speeding ticket, it’s not the end of the [01:25:00] world.

So I, um, I’m above the law, um, or I can feel as if I am, um, and I don’t feel like I’m above the law. I just feel like I have to be free. And I feel like this is so wretchedly, unfree. That’s what I feel. This is so wretchedly unfree. There’s no freedom of the open road if I’m driving along at 50 miles an hour behind the guy in front, average speed check.

I mean, this is, this is the thing. We’re going to move slowly into. Automation because so much driving is not going to be real driving. It’s going to be average speed check. Already is average speed checking along behind the guy in front. These 20 mile an hour speed limits in cities like Paris or in Wales at the moment, I mean, [01:26:00] there is.

increasingly less freedom of of the open road. And it is, I mean, I began today with a story about with three rather poorly told actually stories about how much joy Riding fast on motorcycles gives me, or riding fast on bicycles gives me how much joy going fast, throwing caution to the, not throwing caution to the wind, but just having an enjoyable motoring experience.

And this is just crushing all the joy out of motoring and therefore, for me, crushing a lot of the joy out of life. And that. makes me really angry and it’s completely unnecessary and I know lots of people and I know safety blah. You know, it was personified for me by the experience that my [01:27:00] son and I had at Stonehenge.

Now you won’t be aware and I wasn’t aware at the time but some twats just stop oil twats through paint on the stones and I don’t want to Talk about that necessarily at the moment, but, but what it meant was that I think the overall, I’m going to say it not suffocation of Stonehenge was, was even more complete.

And, and, you know, we’d gone to Avebury before we touched the stones at Avebury, we walked the Avenue of the Giants. Um, we’d sat in the pub and had a, you know, we, we’d had a great, you know, proper. It’s proper amongst the stones, kind of experience, because if you don’t, if you’re not aware, there are 000 stone circles across England, Scotland, across England, Scotland, [01:28:00] Wales, Ireland, and Northern France, especially Northern France.

So given all these stone circles, Stonehenge is merely the biggest. So I understand why people want to go to that one. It’s the only one with the lintel stones as, as, as well. Now, when I was a boy. You could still walk under the stones. I’m not sure if I ever did, but you could. By the time I was a teenager, um, you, there was a road that ran up the side of it.

There always was a main road that ran past it, but it was at a junction and they have turned that, taken that junction away and it’s now grassland. Um,

You used to be able to, there were a couple of roads nearby, you used to be able to get up that side road, and then you could turn and near [01:29:00] where Woodhenge is, you could turn and look at Stonehenge without, um, you know, needing to be on the road and really close where it’s hard to see where you can actually see it spot in the land because it’s not on a high spot of land.

It’s, it’s slightly Downhill. So there were two or three of those roads that I was ready to try. That the last time I was there, that’s probably, probably got to be 10 years ago now, um, is the era of the black Mondeo that I had, I remember parking up there and actually climbing up onto the hood is terrible paint that car.

So I just climbed up onto the hood and sat on the roof. And I remember, um, Looking out across Stonehenge there and realizing that it was the center of visualizing how looking across, you know, Salisbury Plain there, you could visualize how Woodhenge was there as well and really having a profound Stonehenge moment.

And I wanted that for my son. You know, I didn’t want him to be like, [01:30:00] Oh, you know, you know, give me a, you know, give me a tie dye t shirt straight away. Jerry Garcia is my new hero kind of thing. I wasn’t expecting that. I just wanted him to actually understand something because the last time. Um, so the time I was there in the black Mondeo, there was.

The beginnings of like a visitor center and you couldn’t, uh, there was a car park nearby and you couldn’t actually get close to the stones. You had to like go to the visitor center and buy a ticket and walk down and walk across the road. And if you just drove and parked up, you could just park in a car park and walk and look over the fence.

And it wasn’t that good, but. But you couldn’t get close to the stones and walk under the stones anyway. Well, now they’ve closed that road that ran up the side of it. They’ve made it impossible to park anywhere on the main road that runs up the other side of it. So now the only way to do it is to go to the car park, which is, um, up and, uh, which is, [01:31:00] uh, Good, I would say two miles from the Henge itself.

Um, you have to go there. And so it’s like a Disney experience, isn’t it? It’s like the fucking Getty Center in L. A. You know, you go, you pay for the parking, you park the car, it’s all nice and clean. You wait for the train, you ride the train up, you go ooh and ahh at the art, you know. It feels like Buck Rogers in the 25th century.

Yeah, that works in L. A. Getty Center’s cool. But, but, for Stonehenge? For Stonehenge, I have to fucking ride some fucking bus and pay and be talked out by Stonehenge for its first building in the year 3000 BC. No, that’s not what it’s about. That’s not what it’s been about for many, many years. It’s about the mystery of it.

It’s about that we don’t understand. It’s not about in the year 1066. It’s not about that. It’s about sensing something that’s mystical and deeper and older than we can possibly fathom. [01:32:00] So they bollocks that up and that pissed me off. But you see, I made the boy walk to, um, uh, Wayland Smithy near Uffington Castle and I made him walk around Uffington Castle and we walked, um, we did Silbury Hill and we did, there’s a, is it West Kennet Long Barrow?

Um, if you’ve not It is West Kennet Long Barrow. That’s near Silbury Hill, um, I, and not far from Stonehenge and Avebury, close to Avebury, um, that West Kennet Long Barrow. It’s off the road. It’s a bit of a hike, not too far. Um, that was really, really worthwhile. That’s 5000 BC, which just boggles the mind.

That place, that tomb was already 3000 years old when Avebury Henge was built. I mean, it just, you just, uh, yeah. So, uh, I enjoyed that. I think my son got a proper sense of, of, of that. Um, [01:33:00] but the Stonehenge experience was blunted by too much modernity, too many people, too many rules. Um, and this bong bong for speeding and this, um, you know, ah, yeah.

Like just. Just yeah, I’m just I’m a grumpy old man aren’t I? Just a grumpy old man. Um, So we stayed at the Fox and Hounds. I mentioned that in, uh, in this village near, near Ruffington. We stayed at the Princess Royal, um, outside Farnham. Um, did that of course for the Mike Hawthorne stuff. Um, uh, he’s just off the Hogsback and I couldn’t recommend it.

The reason I’ve mentioned it as I’ve stayed there a couple of times, I know that’s a really good. Uh, good place to stay. Um, uh, so a lot of beer was consumed. The bacon is better in England. Um, Americans may disagree. My son, traitorously, even says he prefers the streaky bit of [01:34:00] bacon to the round bit of bacon.

But I’m telling you, the bacon is, is better in England. Uh, uh, I mentioned that I had a fifth peak and thrashed up the M3. Um, I eventually found a safe way, found the safe way right inside the bifleet banking. I’m going to go out of the car, I was around, Ollie, do you realize what that is? And he went, yeah, it’s the Brooklyn’s banking as much as say, like, duh, I guess when you’ve been to Daytona and you’ve seen Daytona, it’s like kind of the same thing, but he was underwhelmed by that.

But, uh, I had two Safeway, um, two Tesco cappuccinos, a bacon BAP, and most of Ollie’s banking. breakfast and my own breakfast in a moment of extreme decadence before we went and looked around the, uh, the Brooklyn’s museum. And so it’s probably no wonder I felt a bit head spinny when it was 27 degrees inside the, the, uh, Concord during the Concord experience.[01:35:00]

So we flew home to California the following day, the day after we got back, it was the Hillsborough Concord elegance. Um, and on the face of it, it’s a provincial car show, um, but Hillsborough is the province, Hillsborough and Atherton, which, uh, uh, two of the nicer bits of, uh, Silicon Valley. So the caliber of cars that turns out, oh, my word, like really, really cool cars, um.

Through a friend, I was asked to, to step in and do a couple of [01:36:00] tours. Um, I did one for, for the sponsor group. Um, uh, I wish I could remember their name. I’ll dub it in if I can, uh, if I can remember their name. Um, thanks to them for sponsoring the, uh, the show and all. I felt as if I did a pretty good tour for them.

I only had three quarters of an hour, but people don’t want the tour to be much longer than that, do they? Um, Uh, I guess the main news for, so what can I say about, uh, so the main, I mean, what should I say about the show? Um, Haggerty have a program of, of junior judging and I was asked to lead the Haggerty junior judges as well, which, uh, obviously working with children and animals is always a bit intimidating.

You never know quite what you’re going to get. But also it’s extremely rewarding. And in this case, um, by keeping the pace up and, and having a clear idea about what I wanted to [01:37:00] do. And, you know, applying the KISS principle of keep it simple, stupid. Um, we really did a good job. So I asked my son, which cars he thought we should include.

And of course that yielded a couple of things that, um, some things that I would have expected to do, the Can Am car made out of titanium with the 900 horsepower Chevy big block, you know, that. That, you know, was, uh, but he, Ollie also suggested we look at, um, one of the Ferrari, um, challenge cup cars that they had a little, little class of, and, and I, of course, had zoned out on the modern stuff.

And he thought that stuff was cool. And a lot of the kids in the group, um, they thought it was cool as well when we, when we went around and looked at them. So this is kids of all ages from like four and five up to, you know, 12 and that kind of age. So some kids that really know what they’re doing, others that, that, that don’t, um, I just told them what I really needed to look for was, you know, it was a concord delegates and what elegance means is, you know, [01:38:00] is it elegant or what does elegant mean where really what it means is, is it cool?

If you can find something about it that you think is cool or not cool, that’s what we’re really, you know, judging here. That’s how you’re gonna decide which one is, is, is your favorite, which one’s the best in show. So we went from that to this 1929 Rolls Royce that has like a woody, shooting break y kind of Body and it’s not a shooting break is he’s got four doors.

So it’s not a shooting break. It’s a, anyway, it’s got a woody body on it. Lovely restoration on it. Well, the guide, like a restoration books, he had the whole tool roll. They absolutely love the theater of that. Cause that’s what it’s about, right? That’s why kids can judge a car show perfectly legitimately, because it’s about the theater, you know, and, and in the judging, um, that was, uh, that was reflected.

The hood was open. We could see what was happening there. Um, Looked at this boss for 29 Mustang is a car that I actually saw once parked up in the Stanford [01:39:00] parking lot in the Stanford mall parking lot. One time it’s a black for 29. I mean, it’s all you probably don’t know. You may or may not know all of them were four speed top loader cars.

So it’s just it’s a Mustang with a NASCAR motor. Like it’s the motor that was that Ford were going to use to defeat the legendary Hemi. You know, it’s, it’s a. Hemi head Ford motor, but they weren’t allowed to develop it because it was banned by NASCAR. So it only ever went into these Mustangs. Um, you know, I dare say they don’t handle worth a damn because they’ve got this massive NASCAR motor and they needed to cut up the shock towers to make the motor fit and all this kind of thing.

But I mean, this particular car is black over black. Um, 69. We just really, really looks the business. So talked about that car then talked about there was a row of Ferraris opposite. You have to walk and talk when you do a tour or you can’t. You might want to talk about the hot rod at the [01:40:00] other end of the field.

But if it’s at the other end of the field, it’s going to take you five minutes to get there. You can’t do that. You have to bounce around. You have to walk a little bit and talk a little bit and you have to judge the cars that you’re going to talk about. Yep. Well, across the way, there was a Ferrari.

There’s a row of Ferraris. You can’t ignore the row of Ferraris. Um, so I picked the best in a row of red 308s and 328s and that kind of stuff. There was a silver 330 GT. See, I think they called it there. Yeah. Coupe. Um, anyway, but the last of that, like two 50 area, um, car, the three 30, um, have a soft spot for that era of car.

Did that job hot air ballooning in France, all those years ago, really nice hotel in the Loire Valley domain to Beauvoir. Hot air balloon client, this German guy who’d made his money selling stamps of all things. How bloody 20th century is that? [01:41:00] A millionaire from selling stamps. Um, I don’t know if he was a millionaire, but he could stay at Domaine de Beauvoir and he’d drive over in this red over tan Ferrari 330.

This is before they were worth tons and tons. This is what, 95, 96, but it would always be covered in flies and have the yellow French headlights. It was, uh, red over tan, but the tan was, it was just patinated. It was stone chippy. It was the year that Baranis were like. You know, when I’ve said pitted, but you know, the car was, was being driven.

Right. So we’re just, just, just awesome. Right. So this car had that kind of, uh, this car’s a silver over red leather anyway. So as the kids are looking at the car, boat comes up young guy must be, you know, half my age is like. Do they want to sit under the hood? Do they want to sit in? And I’m like, you, the owner.

And he’s like, Oh yes, I am. And I’m like, well, my dad is. And I’m like, all righty. Yes. Like, can we sit in? Um, [01:42:00] cause I’d just been talking about the interior. Then we looked under the hood. Wow. They, they, the kids absolutely love that. Um, the guy, the guy was like, this is what I remember. The guy was like, these are the real judges.

Not those old guys. I don’t care about those old guys. These are the real judges. And he’s. Absolutely right, because what I was talking with him about was he realizes that if we don’t get little kids into it, if they, they’re not around these old Ferraris, these old GSXRs, if they’ve never seen them or heard them run, they’re not going to be into them.

They’re not going to give a shit. You care about the things that you’ve experienced yourself if you’ve never experienced them. So we are duty bound. So those kids sat in a Ferrari, they felt the gnarly steering wheel, you know, the owner’s made up. The kids are made up. I, it was the moment that made my day when the guy rocked up and was like, do you want to sit in?

It’s just absolutely, uh, awesome, uh, car guy moment. [01:43:00] Um, the 900 horsepower McLaren big block needs a rebuild every 12 hours. It was made completely of titanium. That was the particular wrinkle on this particular, I can’t even remember what the name of this weird and wonderful Calam car was. Um, so those are the cars that I had them choose between every car got two points, two votes.

And then, uh, um, the, uh, the Ferrari won the, the Ferrari 330 won the decider, which was, um, if you think about the cars I, I chose the Ferrari challenge car, Pre war Rolls Royce, 1929 Rolls Royce, um, the Boss Mustang, 69 Boss Mustang, the Ferrari 330 and the Can Am car. Those are the ones I chose. I feel like we achieved a great compromise of, of elegance and, uh, uh, Yeah, of elegance and performance, you know, and, uh, uh, by picking that 330.

So, yeah, so that was a [01:44:00] super, um, enjoyable kind of experience at the Hillsborough Concourse. So I’m going to wrap up this episode that talks about the, uh, my, my time in England by, by saying that that day that we went to Brooklyn’s, um, that morning, um, my son was like, I want to have breakfast out. And I went, well, I know this area.

I used to work around here years ago. He went, well, you must know somewhere good to eat. I went, yeah. He went, what is it? I went, there used to be a bacon sandwich van just down towards Godelman. Godelman was the town that I used to work in. There used to be a bacon, and my son went, no more bacon. I cannot do any more bacon.[01:45:00] [01:46:00]

This episode has been brought to you by Grand Touring Motorsports as part of our Motoring Podcast Network. For more episodes like this, tune in each week for more exciting and educational content from organizations like The Exotic Car Marketplace, The Motoring Historian, BrakeFix, and many others. If you’d like to support Grand Touring Motorsports and the Motoring Podcast Network, sign up for one of our many sponsorship tiers at www.

patreon. com forward slash GT Motorsports. Please note that the content, opinions, and materials presented and expressed in this episode are those of its creator. And this episode has been published with their consent. If you have any inquiries about this program, please contact the creators of this episode via email or social media, as mentioned in the [01:47:00] episode.

Enjoy more Motoring Historian Podcast Episodes!

The Motoring Historian is produced and sponsored by The Motoring Podcast Network

Podcast Tags:, ,

Related Posts

EP12: Fighting the System in New England; Goodwood in Old England, “High 4” and Panteras Jumping off Trains Podcast
EP25: Hot August Nights 2024; BLS Podcast
EP9: ZF, Drifting Tundras, Baja California and a Quad into an Electric Fence Podcast
EP19: Company Cars Running Wild Podcast
SPECIAL: MILLE MIGLIA 1954-1957 & Beyond! Podcast
EP16: Designing Emotion, Formula 1 & Ferrari Podcast

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.