The NHRA or National Hot Rod Association was founded by Wally Parks in 1951, he wanted to get drag racing off the streets and onto safer, professional level tracks and in doing so he doubtless saved a lot of young men’s lives throughout the 50’s and 60’s.
This wonderful onboard footage with Jim Clark at the 1963 Oulton Park Grand Prix give a great drivers eye view of what it was like to pilot a 60s era Formula 1 car
The Austin Healy Sprite is, in my opinion, one of the best British cars from the golden age of affordable lightweight sports cars. I was never a big fan of the Mark I Frogeye but the Mark IV has always had significant appeal.
The Magnolia Special Roadster is surprisingly not British. Or even European. This unique, compressed natural gas roadster was designed and built by motorcycle designer JT Nesbitt (you may be familiar with his bikes over at Confederate) in New Orleans, development started in 2008 with the hand-built Magnolia Special rolling out of the showroom last month.
In this video he takes us on a few flying laps of the Donington Park circuit in the UK and talks us through the laps as well as throwing in some historical tidbits and comparisons to modern day F1 cars.
I can only hope that deades after I have shuffled off this mortal coil there’ll be pictures of me with a big toothy grin standing proudly by a thoroughly raced and slightly bent motorcar.
Fritz Von Opel is one of those historical figures you just can’t help but admire. Most famous for his Rocket Car, Von Opel was the grandson of Adam Opel, founder of the Opel Automobile Company.
This stunning buggy is, very sadly, not real. I was crushingly disappointed although I should probably have realised that a turbine powered desert buggy would probably be illegal in every country except Somalia. I had initially thought it might be a modern reinterpretation of Steve McQueen’s famous Baja Boot buggy.
The Ginetta G40R is set for release at the end of August 2011, the good-looking little beast has the same basic engine/transmission as the ever popular Mazda MX-5
The Ferrari 126 C4 Formula 1 car packs a 600 bhp, 12,200 rpm, 1,496 cc V-6 engine with twin turbo chargers, dual overhead cams and a transverse six-speed manual gearbox.
The 1968 Opel GT started life as a concept car back in 1965, that curved steel body was built under contract by French company Brissonneau & Lotz with most of the running gear and other components coming from the humble 4-door Opel Kadett B.
The Pikes Peak Hill Climb has been running since 1916 and has seen almost every type of vehicle known to man slid around it’s corners from the start at Mile 7 on Pikes Peak Highway at 9,390 ft up to 14,111 ft, covering a climb of 4,721 ft.
