elva-bmw GT160

To put the Elva GT160 into context for someone who doesn't know what it is, would be to explain the near-entirety of the English specials industry which thrived in the 1960's. Club racing was immensely popular and responsible for the accessibility of the sport to normal people. From this interest and activity, many big names were borne from the massive influx of interest in cars and motor racing; Lotus was but one of those companies that has become a household name whilst Elva remains for the most part unknown.

But I am not about to delve into detail on the period, or even the company. We're here for the car. The GT160 is an evolution of the Elva MK7S sports racing car and was intended as a full-production road going sportscar. Ultimately, it was going to cost the low-volume manufacturer far too much to build, and only three ever made it to existance. The car pictured is the last, and as far as we know, the only survivor with its body work still as designed by Fissore in 1964 and as it looked at the Turin Motor Show that year. The GT160 is a curiosity, perhaps because of the mystique that it posseses as a car that never made production, but perhaps because it is such a unique creation. Like a miniature Dino 206S, it cradles its mechanicals amidships to drive the rear wheels under superbly flowing bodywork that in some places echos the 246GT, yet with a sort of Germanic 'straightness' about its sides and tail. As a Fissore design it is very obviously an Italian concoction, and does very well to hide the majority of its proprietary parts stolen from more mainstream models. Note; Alfa Romeo 1600/1750 coupe tail lamps used on the 'wrong' sides. The concealed headlamps and adjustable radiator grilles just forward of the rear wheels lend the car both elegance and purposefulness, which make it seem like a far more complex tool than one would have expected from a low-volume racing car manufacturer in the sixties.

Should the GT160 have reached production it would have done so with the engine pictured; the BMW M10, in two liter capacity as was used by many a sports racer in period and as it were, these Nerus units were a collaboration between the engine's original designer, Alex Von Falkenhausen and Frank Webb from Nerus Engineering. The engine is harnessed the way that would make many a BMW 2002 driver green with envy - driving the rear wheels through a transaxle gearbox and right behind the ear of the driver, gulping air through a pair of Weber 45DCOEs.

It is simply a lovely coupe, and had it made production and been easier to aquire today I am sure it would have a massive following. As it is, we can only admire it in photographs and wonder why BMW didn't take the reins and arrange to produce the GT160 themselves.

ferrari 250 GTE

When conversations about Ferraris start, they inevitably end at several points and revolve about several models. The 250 GTO, the Daytona, the Dino and the Testarossa. Today, the F355, the F50 and the current Enzo are Ferraris that have the magical Ferrari hype surrounding them, mainly because to most mortals, these models are and will always be well beyond their reach. There are however, a raft of Ferraris that have never achieved the school boy's bedroom wall hall-of-fame. Reasons? Ferraris suffer from being made to fit within the realm of the unattainable, anything less, and many will regard them as lesser models that were never meant to be pursued anyway.

Fame, in Ferrari terms, usually involves success at particullar events, parts in TV shows and in film and ownership by members of the uber-rich global society. There is one Ferrari that is famous because it seems to be at the top of the shopping list of anyone who wants to emulate Ferrari's most famous model - the 250 GTO. The car in question is the 250GTE. So many 250 GTE's have been canabalised to create GTO recreations that it is now a genuinely rare Ferrari, particullarly when you consider that there were less than a thousand to begin with.

Some people are not content to appreciate something subtle, something styled to largely avoid attention rather than attract it. The GTE lingered at the bottom of Ferrari values for many years, unloved by enthusiasts as well as those who wanted a Ferrari for kudos, it was relegated and largely forgotten. This, despite the fact that it shares largely all it components with some of the most successful Ferrari racers of the sixties; the 250GT SWB and the immortal GTO.

First problem, the GTE was Ferrari's first 2+2, and thus not regarded well by some purists who considered that a Ferrari should be strictly a two seater. Secondly, it was early in the days of the relationship between Pinin Farina and Ferrari, and the comparitavely sombre straight-line styling that dated rather quickly, put the car at odds with typically flowing, curvy Italian sports cars. Under the skin though, remains the lovely Colombo V12, in six carb guise and with enough urgency to ensure that this is car is no slouch boulevardier whatsoever.

But this was a four-seater! An elegant, and lovely car with restraint and maturity, and something of a Q-car. So much so, that the Roman Police force gained notoriety for having a GTE as a patrol car in the early sixties, along side the green Giulias.

Appreciation should now be snow-balling for this lovely, lovely machine. A fastback with flawless detail, sitting on Borrani alloys with their soft alloy finish that begs to be polished, oval grille opening with auxilliary lamps nesstled at each end. Simple seven inch Carello headlamps that sit high - it looks not entirely unlike a DB5, a car which is today reveered amongst its peers, where this Ferrari is fogotten.

But it was meant to happen. You see, when you have taste, it is possible to recognise that the GTE offers elegance in droves that will get you noticed faster than any of Modena's current crop. It is an understated and svelt GT, and will remain the secret of the true enthusiast. Snap one up before they all vanish.

porsche nine seventeen

This must be the quintessential racing car, the Porsche 917 in all its forms would undoubtedly be one of the most recognised, most successful and most fearsome competition cars ever concieved. A near-400km/h projectile, diminutive and muscular, with features that leave any observer with no doubt that the car has only one purpose.

Throughout the fifties and sixties, Porsche conducted its racing activities with a complement of lightweight machines that were all propelled with mechanicals derived essentially from the 356 and the 911. This limited Porsche to competing within categories where their machinery would be ultimately competitive and whilst this in itself was adequate, Porsche required the hardware to be able to tackle the sport's big guns and so, at the end of the sixties when the F.I.A raised the bar by making the capacity for the main sports class 5 litres, it opened new doors for Porsche to unleash a new powerplant and a new car.

1969 saw the debut of the 917 in its initial 'kurtz' format, it was a difficult car to drive that saw many of Porsche's long standing and more experienced drivers pass up the opportunity and opt to use the proven 908 sports-racer. It was only after long and arduous development, and consultancy with David Piper, that the 917 became a more 'driveable' machine. Piper, a long time accomplished driverwho had a good relationship with the factory team, brought a Lola T70 to lead to the team to drive and observe; aerodynamics became an issue that required rectification and so the 917 "lang heck" or, "long tail" was born. Along with suspension and steering tweaks and a modification to the fuel system which aleviated fuel vaporisation caused by hot exhaust gasses, the modification to the car's tail brought instant high speed stability - and there was no better demonstration than the long L´Hunnadieres straight at Le Mans, where Jackie Oliver recorded 396km/h, at night and in damp conditions. The 917 made the Porsche name synonimous with Le Mans, and endurance racing in general. Whether at La Sarthe or at the Nurburgring, Spa or at Sebring, the 917 was unstoppable.

Seen in its John Wyer 'Gulf' livery it is an instantly recogniseable car, a symbol of the strength and heyday of endurance racing in Europe. It is associated with so many names that nailing one down is impossible but most importantly, it is associated with a motion picture that defined the racing era that it came from; Steve McQueen's Le Mans. A film of minimal dialogue, the resonant exhausts of 917s fighting Ferrari 512s' at night and in the rain cut an image in the immagination of anyone that has seen the film. 917 devotee David Piper lost a leg during a filming sequence that saw him lose control after a rapid tyre deflation and at the conclusion our hero, the 917, is victorious.

Racing cars in this day and age are as clean and efficient as many of the soul-less road cars that one car see everyday on the roads, and the days are gone where we can witness such unbridled power and speed being demonstrated as we saw in the days of the 917. There were other terrific cars that competed against it; the Ferrari 512S, the Alfa Romeo Tipo 33/12 and for a short time, the Ford GT40 but, for some reason none could match the master stroke that Porsche's engineers made on that car. It is will remain a monument to the days when racing cars needed to be handled by men, and were potent dangerous devices that bit back when they weren't respected. Like many of the cars here, we will never see creations like it ever again and they occupy a special place in history, and in the hearts and minds of motor-racing fans everyhere.

innocenti tre, de tomaso turbo

Cars I love. The Innocenti tre, De Tomaso Turbo.

In the sixties, Italian Industrialist Ferdinando Innocenti who had had the rights to producing many BMC products under licence, began building the Mini in Italy for the European market. Whilst initially the cars were built using the A-series engine, hydrolastic suspension and all the other "Issigonisms" that made the Mini what it was, there eventuated a version clothed in Bertone bodywork and sporting the rear hatch that the Mini should have always had. This was a result of the company's sale to Allejandro De Tomaso, creator of the legendary Vallelunga, and the fearsome Pantera and Mangusta. By the middle of the seventies the A series engine was dropped, as was the hydrolastic suspension. In their place were a macpherson strut front end and transverse leaf rear but most importantly a new source had been established for a range of engines - Daihatsu of Japan.

Most important of the new range, which included a diesel and a twin was the 993cc triple, a screamer of a unit which for a time was the world's most powerful sub-1000cc petrol engine. These endowed the car with terrific performance yet, by the time the mid-eighties had come round, this unit had been gifted a turbo-charger and the ultimate model emerged; the Minitre, De Tomaso Turbo. A Fiat Uno Turbo eater, if there ever really was one. So what we have here is the mini for the italian car enthusiast, but with Japanese power. A hybrid by anyone's measure and unique, the De tomaso Minitre; an academicar.

mercedes benz 300SEL 6.3

Nowadays, when a car company launches a cost-no-object luxury flagship that can accelerate to 100km/h in under 8 seconds whilst being loaded 5-up with two sets of golf clubs in the boot - nobody bats an eyelid. Luxury saloons from the likes of BMW and Mercedes Benz have grown obese and are obscenely large in external proportion, in comparisson to their older relatives from the sixties and seventies. It is a given in today's market that the latest large, luxury saloon from MB / BMW or Lexus et al, will be a sound handling, blindingly fast car that will make any description of it a list of superlatives setting the creators of its contemporaries into a flurry of activity to create a better, newer model. But it hasn't always been this way.

There was a time when a particullar style of car was designed around a set of objectives, and the objectives set out for luxury saloons in the sixties were usually comfort and range before the days of air-travel for all, when crossing Europe by car was a real possibiity for executives and politicians, and flogging the latest sports cars from the lights in your Rover, Roller or Lagonda was not a priority.

So in 1964, when Mercedes Benz launched the flag-ship W108/109 saloons, the humble 2.5 and 2.8 liter in-line sixes, with overhead cam and either a pair of carburettors or the then-new bosch mechanical fuel injection would suffice. They would allow for reasonable performance and economy (not so important then), decent flexibility and low maintenance. These cars were the first of a genre that would go onto define elegance and class after the British car-making industry would fall apart - the immortal Mercedes 'S' Class.

Now the W108 and 109 were comfortable cars, and for their time they had shades of oppulence but these were not Rolls Royces, there were no crystal decanters or fold down tables here, oh no. The automobile was no place to be dining on cucumber sandwiches and sherry, whilst Jeeves ferryed you from place to place in 60's Germany. The time and effort spent developing cars like the W108s was spent where it mattered- to the driver, as the days of chauffer driven cars was ending. The suspension and chassis and their effects on driving dynamics were now the priority along with ease in operation, so to were efficient new automatic gearboxes, smooth and well weighted power steering and as already mentioned, refined engines with 'adequate' power. Rather than define themselves with wilton carpets and connolly leather, Mercedes Benz were intent on producing cars that could be DRIVEN.

This theory may then go some way to explaining how it came to be that a Mercedes S class saloon with a 300 horse power 6.3 litre version of the mighty M100 V8, made it to the Mercedes Benz catalogue for the model year 1967.

The 6.3 began its life as a private project of MB engineering employee Erich Waxemberger in 1966, essentially as an experiment to see how the engine of the uber-luxo barge, the MB 600 limo, would fare in the smaller and lighter W109 chassis. The result was so successful that the then-conservative folks at MB decided that productionising this car would not only facilitate cost cutting on M100 engine production, but would raise valuable interest in the marque from new corners. The car was successfully marketed and produced from 1969 to 1972, becomming the world's fastest saloon and importantly is recognised by many today as the first Q-car, to many the ultimate 'wolf in sheeps clothing'. Collossal power and torque gave this big car the ability to embarrass many a Porsche 911 owner in period, suspension by air-filled spheres endowed it not only with a magnificent ride, but with handling that allowed the driver to exploit the power of the engine, whilst being applied only through the 14" rear wheels. To think of that amount of 300 horse power being applied through such small wheels today, seems like lunacy in itself. Soon after production began, 6.3's were turning up in Formula One paddocks as racing driver after racing driver chose the car as their personal transport. So unidentifiable from its lesser siblings was it, that it became a popular choice of steed amongst people who required Ferrari performance without Ferrari looks.

Looking at the specs of the 6.3 today doesn't raise too many eyebrows; 300 horse power V8, fuel injected with a 4 speed automatic gearbox. Air filled suspension, power steering, central locking, air conditioning, perhaps a sun roof. These are features that even Japanese luxury saloons boast, but in period there was nothing that matched a 300SEL as a sheer all-or-nothing fast saloon, the car is legendary and only its successor, the ungainly looking W116 series 450SEL 6.9 would ever rival it as a European luxo-barge with supercar baiting performance. There will never be another large, luxury saloon of the likes of the 6.3, because nothing could ever have the same impact. Long live the Q-car, long live the 6.3.

matra ms530

An unquestionable academicar is the Matra MS530, a rarity today even in its home market, France.
Matra is a name which has all but vanished today, the name is synonimous with screaming V12 engines at Le Mans and Jacki Stewart in the immortal DFV powered grand prix car, typically snapped cresting bends in terrific opposite lock poses. Matra's motorsport dossier is a long one, the company having achieved some tremendous accolades in the 60's and 70's before the company was absorbed by Renault in the eighties, used to produce the now famous Espace and more recently, the Avantime.

The 530 however, is a car worthy of placement on this page as it subscribes to every book of avant garde. A mid engined 2+2, the MS530 was unveiled at the 1967 Geneva show and was subsequently released for sale twelve months later. It is a car that is really unlike any other and attempting to pick styling cues are ultimately futile, as this Matra is a unique design. The synthetic fibre body covers a welded plate steel chassis and conceals the Ford V4 lifted from the European Taunus, driving the rear wheels through a mated Ford gearbox, whilst four-wheel disks impede progress. Concealed headlamps on the nose bookend a puckered oval opening for cooling air to suply the front-mounted radiator. Typical French 'skinniness' sets the car apart from contemporaries like the Porsche 914, with which it shares its mechanical layout and Targa-style removable roof panel. Unlike its contemporaries, the Matra has an exquisitely formed body with contours that look as though they have been formed by a pallet knife and a low-slung appeal that sets it apart from any other four cylinder coupes that are generally betrayed for being tied down by saloon car underpinnings.

In 1969 the 530 was given an engine upgrade and a pair of Solex carburettors which helped to raise the bhp figure by 5bhp, and in 1970 the 530 became the 530LX as a change was implemented to have the car distrubed through the Simca dealer network in Europe. The model had some competition pedigree in rallying but featured rarely on race tracks.

Essentially, the Matra MS530 is a beautifully lithe and well proportioned small GT, a nimble tool, its rarity adding to its enthusiast-only appeal. It is a medal to the tastes of owners who have chosen to make it their interest and gives the rest of us reassurance that car design has well and truely hit the wall, as one after another copy-cat sportscar emerges from the design-by-comittee desks of the world's globalised car manufacturers.

alfa romeo giulia/105

For many Alfa enthusiasts today, the Giulia 105 & 115 series cars are the focus of their passion. For the glory years, 1962 through 1976, the Alfa 105/115 series cars formed the mainstay of production at the Arese plant and were so successful that they were produced in unicin with their successor, the 116 series, for a number of years. Not only that, but in 1971 the Pomigliano d'Arco factory in Naples was opened to begin production of the Alfasud, a car which brought a wave of new design and engineering solutions to the Alfa Romeo portfolio yet, the now technically out-moded 105 series cars proved so popular that demand continued until the 105 2000GTV was finally replaced by the 116 series Alfetta GTV.

Why are the Giulia and 105 series cars so popular?

Firstly, the 'Giulia' moniker technically only applies to the cars built pre-1968. These include the Giulia ti and Giulia Super Saloons, the Giulia Sprint GT & GT Veloce, the Giulia Spiders and the immortal Giulia Sprint GTA. All these cars carried the prefix '105...' on the beginning of their type code, and the type continued during and after 1968 when the range was updated albeit, without the 'Giulia' tag on all but one model; the darling Giulia Super and Giulia Super Nuova that contined to 1974. For many enthusiasts though, the cars are emphatically refered to, across the board as 'Giulias'.

In 1968, a big year at Milan, the 105 series cars were updated both aesthetically and under the skin. All models recieved German ATE brakes in liu of the more temperamental Dunlop items. The 1779cc version of the ever-green twin cam was introduced under the the retro-title '1750', the original Giorietto Giugiaro coupe body shell was re-styled, predominantly in the nose, where the now sought-after 'step' at the bonnet's leading edge was deleted, a new four headlamp grille was introduced and internally the somewhat sombre dash facade was replaced by a new unit that was dominated by seperate binnacles for the tachometer and speedometer. There were many other technical changes such as the change on many models from cable to hydraulically operated clutch and the change from 15X4.5" Fergat steel wheels to 14X5.5" CMR steels with a new, bold re-style of the hubcaps.

For the saloons, whilst not deleted, the Giulia Super was offered alongside the new 1750 Berlina, an externally bigger and more gracious but less visually appealing car that attempted to take on a more grown up appeal. The 1750 Saloon was the beginning of the 'Berlina' line which was ultimately concluded by the 2000 Berlina before, like the coupe, being superceded by the 116 Alfetta saloon.

In the Spider department, the 105 series cars had always been penned and assembled by Pininfarina, the original car of 1963 having been dubbed 'Duetto' by the winner of an Italian competition to find a name for the boat-tailed coupe, which was never officially labelled as such by the factory, but was refered to as both 'Duetto' and as the 'Osso d'sepia' or 'cuttlefish' by enthusiasts forever. The gorgeous boat-tailed spider was offered with all the same engine options and upgrades as the Saloons and GTs and like the coupe, was updated in 1968. Farina lopped the tail off in a controversial move to both increase the practical use of the boot and to improve questionable aerodynamics which were to some extent remedied with the new Kamm tail. The spider would turn out to be the longest running of this line of cars and whilst updated almost beyond recongnition it was being produced until the mid-nineties.

All detail and technicality aside, there is an appeal which is possessed by these cars that stretches far beyond the mechanical specification on paper. Sure, in the early to mid sixties and even into the seventies it was not common for mass-produced cars to feature such lively twin overhead cam engines, nor to have five-speed gearboxes, four-wheel disc brakes or such fluid handling bestowed by the superb location of the rear axle and front wishbones by four coil-springs and mutliple links and those specifications lent the cars a special place in the hearts of sporting drivers around the world. It is an intangible that makes these cars so special, it is the feeling of driving a car that it really quite humble yet feels so exotic. Even today, to compare a car of the sixties with a modern is a trifle futile, but there have nver been many manual gearboxes that can match the fluidity of an Alfa 105 5-speeder. The rortiness and power delivery of the twin cam, whether in the free-revving nature of the 1300 and 1600, the special 1750 allrounder that feels unbreakable or the seamless wave of torque that is gifted by the last-of-the-line 2000's - all are totally adictive, whilst they snort and spit through their paired side-drafts and rock on their often-cracked mounts, the engine is the heart of any Alfa and is usually the reason that people get hooked. The appeal of these engines is so strong, one can find themselves in love with a totally rotten example because of its contribution to the experience.

The interiors of all these cars are superb. They wear their switchgear and instruments like jewellery, perfectly positioned to be legible and functional yet having the appeal and adding the atmosphere that would fool you into beliving you were piloting a Ferrari 330 and not an Alfa. The primary and secondary controls are always just to hand, being placed thoughtfully and safely at the fast driver's convenience, the action of the floor mounted pedals (in RHD cars), easy to learn but hard to master is unique and the response of the steering quite unlike any of it contemporaries. A well driven 105 will reward for a long time.

Parked in your garage an Alfa 105 is a trophy, a symbol that will make you realise that you appreciate driving and can handle what really is a fine car. There are more robust cars, faster cars and better handling cars, but the Alfa Romeo Giulia - be it a Spider, a GT, or even a Saloon will be one of the best packages ever designed and built. A true masterpiece.

lancia stratos

Over the decades, International Rallying has produced a wealth of ferocious, immensely capable, innovative and desireable machines, but nearly all of them have been derived from relatively mundane showroom models. Rallying as we know it has evolved as a product of car manufacturers pitting their sporting models against one another and it is exists today as a tool for manufacturers to promote and demonstrate what their companies are capable of. To quote an old cliche - "racing improves the breed", and to a certain extent, on-track success can be translated into bountiful sales figures. So then, it stands to reason that almost all of the sensational machinery that we have seen in rallying are evolved of popular production cars. Except one in particullar; the Lancia Stratos.

The Lancia Stratos was built with only one major objective - to win the World Rally Championship. And that, it did four times. A total of seventeen world rally championship victories have cemented the Stratos as part of Rallying folk lore, it is an icon and remains the only 'supercar' to tackle the prize. Those are only partly the reasons that the car is part of my list. The Lancia Stratos packs one of the nicest engines to ever grace the road - the Ferrari Dino V6, in 2.4 litre form. The Dino engine is a jewel. It is a 65 degree V6 with light alloy cylinder heads topping a cast iron block. All you need is to look at a Dino engine on a stand to realise that there is nothing mundane or utalitarian about this engine - despite its Fiat connections. Carburettion on the road cars is via three synchronous down draft Webers and ignition via dual Marelli distributers. A pair of chain-driven cams per bank operate twelve valves, and thanks to the firing order which basically treats this engine as a three V-twins sharing a common crank, it has been gifted with a throbbing note at idle that flattens out as the revs gather. This is pure Dino DNA, and will make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up if you've ever had the privalege of its experience.

This engine, visually and aurally is a work of art. In the 'tipo strada' road cars, it is almost identical in specification to the 246 GT Dino road cars but in Group 4 rally trim the unit raises another 80bhp, giving it 270bhp. The power is harnessed only by the dino-type transverse gearbox and the rear wheels, specifications that by today's standards make the car look woefully under-equiped for the kind of competition it was intended for.

Unlike almost all the Stratos' contemporary opposition which were almost all front engine / rear drive machines, it is a car that made good drivers shine and bad drivers quiver. The Stratos is a prescision tool, it has been said recently and I quote "If the Escort was a hammer and the 911 a scalpel, then the Stratos is the Laser-Surgery of Rallying".

Forgetting all the Stratos' specifications, even the styling takes the car into the realm of the real cream of of enthusiast cars. It is one of the works of Marcello Gandini, but to describe the way it looks is to do it no justice, and photos only serve slightly better. Only in the flesh does the Lancia Stratos really make sense. It is of extremely short wheel base, which exagerates the height of the roof in profile - a quantity not helped in Alitalia race trim, where the gigantic letter 'A's that addorned the sides draw your eyes to the highest part of the body. Glazing is minimal, like any supercar, but rear window slats, ala Lamborghini Urraco make the shape even less graceful. But it just isn't grace, or specific design cues that make the Stratos a beautiful car. Next to the swooping, curvy Dino GT it is an almost cubist coupe, but it has a purposefulness that defines it beyond the realm of almost any other Italian GT. The Stratos is defined by its achievement, and to a casual observer the wedge may not be able to compete in the beauty stakes in parrallel with Miura, Dino or even the Merak or the 308GTB but it is a gorgeous car.

The limited run of road cars existed only to allow Lancia to homologate the competition cars, so clapping eyes upon one of the 500-odd will be a feat in itself, let alone the prospect of ownership. The Stratos is by no means an obscurity like many of the other cars that I will write about here, but its mechanical and asthetic beauty, its purposfulness and its achievement make it a car of total academic merit to the car nut.

gregoire sport

France is responsible for so many avant-garde and out of the ordinary specials and production cars. Many of them have faded off into obscurity, sending their creators broke, or have been so exotic in their constitution that they never stood a chance at real series production. One such delight is the Gregoire Sport. From the outset, this machine looks like a parody of itself or, at the very least like a tin plate model of itself - its proportions exagerated, as if the stylist had coppied the shape from somewhere and attempted to hide its origins. Far from it though. Jean-Albert Gregoire, its creator, was previously responsible for the Hotchkiss-Gregoire, a car, like the Sport, that was way ahead of its time. This hybrid with its water-cooled flat four flung out ahead of the front axle and driving the front wheels, had a frame of cast alloy and proportions that would make it look almost at home amongst today's traffic, yet it was produced from 1951 to '54. It was manufactured at a horrific loss and severed the relationship between Gregoire and the now-defunct French car maker, Hotchkiss.

Despite the failure of the Hotchkiss Gregoire Saloon, the man himself was inspired by a one-time fitment of a Constantin Supercharger to one Hotchkiss Gregoire and its resulting performance. He wanted a sportscar, and thus the 'Sport' was born. In Gregoire himself we're talking about a smart guy - he invented the CV joint as we know it, and despite his failings as a car-maker, can be counted amongst the most accomplished as a major automotive brain.

So, the resulting sports car with its Henri Chapron body today remains something of a priceless rarity as it, along with its brother, the Hotchkiss Gregoire was a commercial flop.

The engine is a 2.1 litre flat four, supercharged and producing some 120bhp, driving the front wheels through a four-speed coloumn activated gearbox and it is cradled in a two-piece cast alloy scuttle which incorporates the windscreen frame and has panels of light alloy. The car was penned by Carlo Delaisse, the main stylist of Henri Chapron - the company more famous for producing exotic 'decapotable' versions of 'normal' Citroens. It really looks like something from a toy shop - or straight out of Thunderbirds. The boxer engine forces massive front overhang, and the rear echoes that of the front for visual balance. A great swage line runs the length of the body eminating from the leading edge of the rounded-off, flat topped wheel arch and petering away at the end of the rear flank. Great slabs of chrome in the bumpers, sill trims and gothic grille lend an art-deco look that confuses the cars origins - it is not petit and typically French like anything from Djet or any Renault special of the period. If anything, the Sport could be badged a Lancia and it might be believable, and a casual observer could be forgiven for labelling it 'American', but it is certainly unique and because of its sheer mechanical and stylistic nature, it is a car that will only ever interest a select few. When it was new it was priced at 3.5 million French Francs which made it about three and a half times as expensive as a Citroen DS. A fraction of the cost would have bought a more straight forward yet commonly exotic Jaguar XK140. To own A Gregoire Sport today would be basically impossible, but as a statement in style there is little that could match it. It is a fabulous car.