Much like poor ol’ Roy Batty, we don’t always get what we want in life. Then again he did live in a world of deep poetic melancholy, sex androids and flying cars. There’s no pleasing everyone.
Christmas shouldn’t be a time of mass consumption but we all should have a wish list for one thing or another though. Having wishes means perhaps you’ll strive to do whatever it is to get there, whether it manifests in reality is another thing but it’s good to have vision.

My wish list has always been cars I guess, as materialistic as it may sound, anyone who has read previous articles knows that this is far from the truth. Driving is an art, car design is art, they bring people together and shared experiences are the best. They become iconic, in the design world and in our everyday worlds, they keep us moving forward.

Cars that appeared on bedroom wall posters, with beautiful women draped over the bodywork for good measure. Cars that evoked vision, adventure and wonderment. They were showcased in quick and clever advertisements that compared them to fighter jet innovation, rousing emotion and almost life changing experiences. Today car commercials are about as exciting as watching someone write a book. Now it’s often some closed road driving sequence with the added excitement of rain to some breathy cover song by a busker.

So without further ado, here is my wish list

1968 Ford Mustang Fastback “Bullitt”

One Saturday afternoon in the late 80s my dad sat me down and produced a VHS tape with the name “Bullitt” written crudely on a TDK white label. He gave me a brief rundown of the plot but the main reason for this little showing was THE car chase. Lieutenant Frank Bullitt is assigned to protect a VIP with a small team. In short, it’s no cakewalk and during the operation Frank is targeted by a couple of hitmen driving a Dodge Charger R/T. The hunted becomes the hunter when Frank turns the chase and manages to ram the men off the road, they then plough into a petrol station and explode, burning to death.

It wasn’t the last shot of the chase that stuck with me, where the passengers hair has nearly all but gone and the sound like bacon sizzling from the cockpit. It was the brutal, snarling sound of the V8 through the streets of San Fran, Steve McQueen’s slick double clutch technique and his effortlessly cool behind the wheel. Because I never shut up about it for the next twelve months, because my dad and I bonded over it, to this day I believe it’d be the first on my list if I won a lottery.

De Tomaso Pantera

I’ve said it before and I’ll said it again, if you don’t walk away from your car and look back at it, you’re driving the wrong car. The De Tomaso Pantera would have me walk away, come back, make sure it’s locked, walk away again, look back, take an easel out and start painting. The Ford V8 in this thing, makes for a jaw dropping start up. I’ve never had the pleasure of driving a Pantera but it is said to be a raw, highly strung machine that doesn’t care much for city driving but would rather be hammering along a highway. Where as the Americans used a big V8 as a tool to get an oversized car moving, the Italians utilized the lump to create a gorgeous display of engineering in the rear of the car. The interior for me is just right too, gated gears, a leather and chrome theme throughout with only a stylish colour palette option. Google it I think you’d agree.

Porsche 911 (930)

I’m ashamed to admit I was young enough to have watched Condorman back in the 80s and enjoyed it. The film didn’t do well at the box office for reasons I haven’t got time for but my lasting memory of this film was the bad guys fleet of murdered out 911’s. Watching these old films now is sometimes hard to watch, cars which now are considered sought after were often beaten like a bad step child. In Condorman, several 911’s were burnt and subsequently thrown off a cliff face.

If like me you browse IMCDb for instances where a car pops up in a film, you would know that Porsche have had a generous mention throughout hollywood and regular TV shows and documentaries. I love the profile of the 930 and the whale tail for me is the icing on the cake. In my dream garage I’d probably use this as a daily, testament to the build quality a large percentage of these classic Porsche’ are still on the road today.

In all honesty I could probably list ten of my dream cars but just these three would have me grinning for a few years. Like and share Retro Motors, comment and tell me what your dream garage would be!

I told you if you pissed me off I’d bring in Dinosaurs

Why am I telling you this? Because, if all this be true, it is perhaps why us men have been given a little leeway when it comes to pleasurable experiences in mortal existence. One of these activities is speed, specifically Motorsports. Back in time when people thought smoking made you stronger and a popular brown soft drink contained cocaine. Men with moustaches slapped numbers on wheeled contraptions and raced from point A to point B to prove a point. We soon figured out you could race just about anything and so we did. I was told that my Grandfather once raced a German tank crew up a mountain during WW2, when he was stationed overseas. The amateur hill climb event was short lived when the German crew went in overzealous and ended up rolling backwards, flipping the tank over, resulting in a fatality and some serious injuries.

Inflatable tanks were much safer

My love of motorsport began early when my parents invited a stranger into our home, who drilled holes in our property and installed an array of technology, including a satellite dish. SKY TV was then accessible 24 hours a day and if there wasn’t a real need for reading and writing, I probably would have spent an abnormal amount of time in front of the box. I attended a monster truck rally in the UK recently and being that I’m well past thirty now, I thought back to my childhood in the late 80’s and didn’t think for one minute I’d get as excited as I did back then. The show, with the addition of expensive hot dogs, beer and the smell of high octane fuel brought back the nostalgia, much to the disgust of the row in front of me as a stood up and sloshed beer over their children shouting GRAVE DIGGER!

Monster trucks began exhibitions back in the 70s and by the 80s some of the trucks became household names. It was effectively a vehicular WWF with rivalries and comebacks just as you’d find in the ring. Trucks such as Bigfoot, Rolling Thunder and Grave digger are old school favourites of mine from the late 80s SKY TV era. Ryan Anderson, second son to Dennis Anderson today drives “Son-uva Digger” carrying on the tradition and inspiring new crowds.

Paranormal mode

A 9,000lb truck running on 66 inch tyres that uses a supercharged, methanol-injected engine that burns around 2.5 gallons of methanol per run isn’t a recipe for Greenpeace but holy shit it’s fun to watch. Today monster truck shows are obviously heavily scrutinised, this isn’t just to limit the amount of shrapnel that gets kicked up by the brutal machines but also because occasionally trucks have been known to veer off course and turn some people into street pizza. If you haven’t experienced a truck show yet, go get some! Just make sure it’s on the tenth row back, on concrete foundations.

Three fucks per gallon

If I enjoyed the sensation of sliding down a mountain strapped to two plastic planks in the cold whilst squinting, I’d take up skiing. Perhaps because of its exhilarating facets skiing was a mere past time for the great Michael Schumacher. The cool calculated style of the German was a marvel to watch as he faced off against turbocharged angry Frenchmen, emotional Italians and Nigel Mansell’s mustache.

I was a keen viewer of late 80s and early 90s Formula one. With it’s eye watering speeds, iconic sounds and characters, there will never be a time in the sport that comes close. Drinking, smoking and cheating were not as frowned upon then as it is today. Todays drivers are abstinent, fresh faced track athletes, sponsored by fashion labels and caffeine drinks.

The retro era F1 was a fascinating mix of intense rivalries, absurd politics and life threatening technologies. Arguably the most beautiful of all cars in the sport was the Lotus, John Player Special 80 to 90 series. With it’s gloss black and minimal gold pinstripe paint scheme, it became an icon in its own right, the performance still wows drivers today.     

Screaming along asphalt in a high octane lightweight winged vehicle, propelled by over a thousand brake horsepower was a recipe for a lunchtime fatality. F1 was fairly unforgiving to the brave pilots in the retro era, watching your friends and or rivals explode was almost an annual occurrence for several decades. The world of F1 changed dramatically however Ayrton Senna’s death in 1994 when he left the track at roughly 190 mph and eventually died after suffering severe injuries. The following year Mansell shaved off his mustache and perhaps further highlighted the effects of these traumatic events. Today fatalities in F1 are rare and that can only be a good thing.

Stick a roof on a race car and you’d be a fool for thinking the racing would be any less exciting. On the Eurosport channel at about the same time I watched less and less F1, I found myself glued to British Touring car championships (BTCC). It was tight, fast racing that utilized cars that you’d often see down your local supermarket. With Murray Walker manning the commentary box and a group of professional drivers in everyday saloons, it made for some edge of the seat viewing.

Us Europeans have been lucky enough to live amongst the greatest driving roads on earth, we also make the fastest cars and produce the best race drivers. In Britain the best drivers in the 80’s and 90’s quite often crossed over to other forms of racing. Our very own Tiff Needell for example has pretty much raced everything decent in the world of motorsport, he’s been the Top Gear Stig and continues to drive sideways for other series today.  Alain Menu was a man I liked to watch in the 90’s, he could shake up a grid, survive contact battles and go on to win. He came to England to race and was so good, he could almost sway you into buying a French car. Some of the best looking cars however were from the world of DTM or Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft for short. The bodykits and liveries from this series of racing really made them stand out and probably helped in the current state of the worlds automotive market.

All told, I feel the passion, pace and noise of retro “analogue” racing will never be beat. Like war perhaps, the human element will eventually be removed so not to endanger lives, with computer controlled vehicles operated from control towers with drone cameras and AI commentary. At least then we could perhaps fix weapons to them.

Speaking of war…I’ll leave you with an advertisement of a series of videos I used to collect. Enjoy!