Jensen`s forgotten Interceptor S4 tested

may 2011
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Heading for the hills in
Yorkshire’s Porsche-beater
Jensen’s forgotten Interceptor S4 tested
Lancia Delta S4 rally
Too wild, even for Group B?
special order jaguar
Beirut to Belgium via Blighty
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Yes, it’s real and we drive it
manta ‘a’ survivor • last days of rootes rallying • mad 1915 wanderer
Duesie duo takes
top Amelia awards
A pair of Duesenbergs took top
honours at the Amelia Island
Concours d’Elégance in March.
One of the fastest, Harry Yeaggy’s
1935 ‘Mormon Meteor’ SJ Special,
claimed Best in Show Concours
de Sport, while The Nethercutt
Collection’s 1933 SJ Arlington
Torpedo Sedan ‘Twenty Grand’,
– the most luxurious and most
expensive built – won Best in
Show Concours d’Elégance.
Ab Jenkins drove the yellow
Speedster to numerous speed
records at Bonneville salt flats
from 1934-36, concluding with a
148.641mph run over 48 hours
with Curtiss Conqueror V12 aero
engine power. It now sports its
original supercharged 6.9-litre
straight-eight, refitted by Jenkins
in 1938 before using the
Speedster as a road car.
The Rollston-bodied Twenty
Grand is so-named because it
cost that many dollars to build as
a show car for the 1933 Century
of Progress Exposition in Chicago,
Illinois. Its metallic platinum
exterior is matched with silver
leather inside.
Both cars are former Pebble
Beach Concours d’Elégance Best
of Show winners, Twenty Grand
in 1980 and Mormon Meteor
in 2007.
This year’s Amelia Island event
pulled together around 250 cars,
focusing on Duesenberg, Kurtis
and Allard, with special
commemorations of Chevrolet
and the Indianapolis 500 (both
100 years old), 40 years since the
first Cannonball Run, and Hot Rod
magazine’s cover cars. For 2012’s
event, keep March 9-11 free.
1947 Steyr-Allard was Sydney Allard’s
own hill climb special and was one of
21 race and street Allards on display
1932 Ford Roadster was the ‘Little
Deuce Coupe’ on the cover of The
Beach Boys’ 1963 album
Best in Show winners: Twenty Grand (left) and Mormon Meteor
Alfa collection ‘is not for sale’
Speculation that Alfa Romeo’s Museo Storico museum in Arese has
closed for good and the collection could be broken-up is rubbish, says the
Italian car manufacturer. An Alfa Romeo spokesperson told Classic Cars: ‘The
museum is temporarily closed while work is undertaken to bring it up to
European and Italian Health and Safety regulations.’
‘The Alfa Romeo Museum – building and contents – is listed by the Italian
Ministry of Arts and Culture and recognised as Italian National patrimony.
There are no plans to either sell the collection or close the museum.’
And far from mothballing the collection Alfa will continue to show and
demonstrate its cars at events such as the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Simon
Kidston
Kuwait concours: full of Eastern promise
ver been to kuwait? Neither had I until
recently, but an invitation from a prime minister
tends to grab your attention. This one came from His
Highness Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammad Al-Sabah,
premier of the tiny oil-rich Gulf state and probably
the Middle East’s most prolific car collector. How prolific? Nobody
will say, but a credible estimate is probably a year’s worth of sales
for all the world’s classic car auction houses. Suddenly Kuwait
sounded very attractive…
The reason for the Sheikh’s hospitality, as you might have
guessed, was car-related. An avid follower of the classic car scene
in the West, where he spent much of his youth, HRH is set on
placing his country at its forefront in the Middle East. Giving
Kuwait its own national concours d’elégance made that very clear.
And that’s how I found myself in a 50-strong party of collectors,
journalists and experts flying out to the second Kuwait Concours.
First impressions? Sunshine wasn’t entirely unexpected, although
mild temperatures were a pleasant surprise; smoking seems to be
as much a national pastime as drinking is taboo; and the odd shellpocked building is a sobering reminder of the true cost of petrol.
Rather than judging or presenting, I’d decided to go to Kuwait
as an entrant, so my already well-travelled black Lamborghini
Miura added another exotic destination to its resumé when it
emerged from the hold of a Boeing 747 into the desert sunlight.
I’m not much of a polisher; the biggest attraction of travelling
2536 miles was the chance to drive a favourite sports car in an
unfamiliar and completely incongruous setting.
The concours turned out to be leisurely, friendly, diverse and
refreshingly innocent. Its organisers are starting from scratch in a
country where until recently cars were disposable commodities or
toys with very short life spans, but that’s slowly changing. In the
meantime the exchange of contrasting cultures is fascinating.
My old friend Valentino Balboni, Lamborghini test driver and
one of several automotive personalities invited to judge the
concours, agreed to drive the SV for a TV shoot. Having filled up
with petrol ($27 – George Osborne take note) we went for a spin,
at which point a 38-year-old halfshaft decided to give up.
The next hour spent waiting for a tow truck by the side of
Kuwait City’s main traffic artery was priceless. At the mere sight of
an unusual car parked up with an audience, locals felt obliged to
show off their own wheels, ranging from a trick Mercedes AMG –
which floored it and sped past with the King’s smiling face
emblazoned across its sun blinds – to a baby-blue Lamborghini
Murciélago whose driver did a double-take and reversed the
wrong way up the highway to check if it really was his hero Signor
Balboni he’d just spotted. Suitably in awe, he came back with an
autograph book and every other car in his collection, each more
powerful than the last (800bhp in a Nissan GTR?!).
Luckily we had a spare Miura – the unique Roadster, no less. I’ll
never forget the sight of a smiling owner in the passenger seat as
Valentino gunned the dazzling turquoise show car down the
coastal road, nor the scrapyard we came across in the suburbs that
revealed a treasure trove of abandoned exotics turning to dust.
The Middle East? They do cars differently there, which makes it
all the more fascinating.
E
Simon Kidston lives and works in a world filled with the finest classics.
In between acting as a consultant to collectors and performing as the
multi-lingual presenter at top European events, Geneva-based Simon
(www.kidston.com) finds time to enjoy his own cars, including a Porsche
911 Carrera 2.7 RS and a Lamborghini Miura SV.
May 2011 /classic cars [[2r]]