Imagine hundreds of important historic racing cars, clear blue skies and a legendary track; that sounds like the perfect event for any automotive enthusiast. It's not just a dream, it exists and was held for the 34th time last week; the Monterey Historic Automobile Races. The event was open to racing cars of up to 1980, with period correct livery. One owner even went a step further and raced with a replica helmet of the original driver. Spectators could not only admire the cars in action, but were also free to roam the paddock and admire the fantastic racing cars up close.
This year the famous Indy Roadsters of the 1950s were celebrated and the weekend was kicked off by lining 33 of them for a shoot on the main straight. It was the start of an action packed weekend, which saw the likes of the Shelby Cobra Daytona, Ferrari 250 GTO, Porsche 935 and Alfa Romeo Tipo B P3 take to the track. There was also an eight-lap "Race of Legends" sponsored by Toyota for legendary drivers like Derek Bell, Parnelli Jones, Al Unser Sr. and Emerson Fittipaldi. They put on a fantastic show in the corkscrew in their Scion tC's.
Our photographers were on hand to capture the event and have returned with a full report and a spectacular 220-shot slideshow.

As the quiet summer season draws to a close, the manufacturers have sprung into action with great effect this week; in rapid succession press releases on the upcoming Frankfurt debuts have hit our desks in the last day or two. So much so that we we had to squeeze in this news flash before focusing on the Monterey Historic Automobile Races.
One of the most anticipated releases is the Jaguar XF, which was previewed as a concept car in Detroit earlier this year. The production version will take centre stage at Frankfurt and has a good chance of continuing the manufacturer's comeback. Similar in size and performance is the Maserati Quattroporte and its range will be expanded with the Sport GT S model. As the somewhat elaborate name indicates, it is an even sportier version than the 'Sport' launched two years earlier. At the Audi stand, all eyes will be on the latest generation A4. Although it has grown in size and weight, the Germans promise a better fuel economy across the range. At the Mercedes Benz stand its again all about performance with the introduction of the 400 bhp and wildly bodykitted SLK 55 AMG Black Series and Smart-Brabus Fortwo Xclusive.
Keep posted for more releases in the coming days and our familiar comprehensive report in two weeks time.

Last week thousands of exceptional cars gathered in the Monterey area for the annual Pebble Beach week-long automotive extravaganza. Today we take a closer look at four of the finest of these, headlined of course by the Pebble-winning Duesenberg SJ 'Mormon Meteor' Special. This unique racing car was directly derived from the great Duesenberg road cars and still managed to beat the airplane-engined competitors at the Bonneville Salt Flats in 1935. After its racing duties were complete it was converted into a road car. Recently it was completely restored to its 1935 specification. Our gallery includes shots of both its current condition and its previous road-car appearance. Another striking machine gracing the lawn at Pebble was this Auburn 12-161A Speedster. Amazingly it was retrieved from inside a bus some ten years ago in very poor condition. It took two years to bring it back to its former glory. A few days earlier 'The Quail, a Motorsports Gathering' was highlighted by the unique Alfa Romeo 8C 2900 B Stabilimenti Farina Cabriolet. It was clothed by the Turin-based coach builder for racing ace and relative Giuseppe Farina. During the Monterey Historics, CanAm cars took centre stage again. Among the many rumbling racers was this McLaren M8F; one of two cars raced by the Works team in 1971. That was the last successful season for the manufacturer that dominated the series five years in a row.
In two weeks time the Frankfurt Motor Show will open its doors for the world media and as always they will be presented with a large number of world debuts. Among them is the Citro�n C5 Airscape Concept, which serves as the styling study to warm the customers up for the next generation C5. At the Subaru stand the new Impreza will grab all the attention. The rally version based on the hatchback is also previewed in the form of the Subaru Impreza WRC Concept.

Last week tens of thousands of automotive enthusiasts flocked to the Monterey Peninsula, two hours south of San Francisco. They were treated to spectacular events day after day, all building up to the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance held on Sunday. This year Aston Martin and Auburn, Cord and Duesenberg were the featured marques at Pebble. Examples from these manufacturers accounted for almost half of the 180-cars that graced the 18th fairway at Pebble Beach. Other featured themes included the 10+ liter cars and the Brooklands Centennial. Many of them also participated in the Tour d'Elegance held a few days earlier on some of America's finest roads. Among the many highlights present were the 1950 Mille Miglia winning Ferrari, twenty Duesenbergs, the oldest surviving Aston and the only Bugatti to have been let go by the Schlumpf brothers.
Our photographers were on hand on both Thursday and Sunday to capture one of the most exclusive events in its entirety. Our thoughts and impressions can be explored in a full report and two slideshows; a 70-shot one for the Tour and a 270-image one for the Concours d'Elegance.
In the coming weeks we will take a closer look at the other events and many of the exceptional cars that were shown/raced over the week. For now, please enjoy our exclusive Pebble feature.

For most of us the Pebble Beach 'concours week' was already busy enough, but apparently not for the people in Carmel, who added yet another event to the calendar this year; the 'Concours on the Avenue'. Held yesterday, it kicked off the series of events this year and hopefully it will remain a set fixture for the coming years. Very well organized, this concours was open to quite a different mix of entries in comparison to the other major events. A full report of the event will be published at a later date, but we could not keep our favourite machine of the event away from you; the Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport Coupe. This one of five Corvette racing cars built in 1963 was well on its way to a successful racing car when it was axed by the GM executives and they even ordered all five to be destroyed. Fortunately all were saved and like the pictured example all of them are in fine running order.
The traditional event opener was always the Christie's auction at the Monterey Jet Center on the Thursday before the Pebble weekend. Tomorrow's sale is highlighted by the Ferrari 250 GT Lusso that was first ordered by legendary actor/racer Steve McQueen. 'The King of Cool' held on to the car for several years and used it both on road and track. It has since been completely restored and is presented by Christie's in concours-winning condition. Who would not want to be in Steven McQueen's seat?

The Meadow Brook Hall Concours d�Elegance has arguably become the best classic car show east of Pebble Beach. Over the past 28 years this Concours has seen thousands of cars, hundreds of judges and hundreds of thousands of visitors and in all that time, one person has masterminded the ordeal. Don Sommer, founder of the Meadow Brook Concours retired last autumn as chairman of the Concours and handed the reigns over to Larry Smith; longtime judge, committee member and car collector himself.
With a new chairman came some changes, welcomed by committee members and participants alike. Along with an impressive list of new sponsors came a first-ever class of motorcycles. An extraordinary group of 32 four-cylinder two-wheelers displayed alongside nearly 230 fine pieces of automotive history ranging from turn-of-the-century brass-era cars to the premiering Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione. Alfa Romeo was honored as the featured marque for 2007 and consisted of three dedicated classes. In addition, the visually stunning B.A.T. prototypes demonstrated just how advanced aerodynamic design had become in the mid 1950�s.
Rob Clements ventured out in rain and shine to capture the Meadow Brook Concours in a 160-shot slideshow.

At the upcoming Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, Aston Martin will be celebrated with four dedicated classes. Three of them will be for post-War examples of the marque, headlined no doubt by several DB4 GT Zagatos. Rumor has it that the organizers are trying to get all nineteen cars to California for this momentous occasion. We will be there to see in person if they succeeded. For now we would like to kick off our Pebble features with a closer look at this, the most sought after of all Aston Martins. More information about the many Monterey bay events of the coming weeks can be found in our extensive future events section. Full reports of all these auctions, concours and races will be published in the days and weeks after.
The DB4 GT Zagato was Aston Martin's final attempt to successfully take on the dominant Ferraris in GT-racing. Zagato had built up quite a reputation for creating race winners by fitting lightweight and slippery bodies on Alfa Romeo, Lancia and Abarth chassis, to name a few. Sadly they failed to do so with the rather heavy DB4 GT, but they did create one of the most beautiful cars ever produced. Today the failure on the racing track is long forgotten and a good DB4 GT Zagato now goes for anywhere between $2 and $3 million. In the late 1980s there were even officially sanctioned replicas made.
To get you nicely warmed up for the Monterey events, we have dug deep in our archives, resulting in a gallery that features no fewer than seven of the nineteen cars.

In less than two weeks time, at the upcoming Pebble Beach Concocours d'Elegance Callaway will complete the C16 line-up with this spectacular C16 Speedster. It comes equipped with a 700 bhp version of the GM's latest LS3 engine and has a striking body to match. Bentley also has some high power news with the Continental GT Speed. Powered by a 600 bhp version of the W12 engine, it is the first production Bentley capable of speeds of over 200 mph. We round off this week's look at the news with the Peugeot 308 RC Z Concept. This concept car will be launched in Frankfurt next month and is a styling exercise to preview the upcoming 308 family car. It could also be a first look at Peugeot's TT, 350Z or Z4 rival.
One of Italy's greatest engineers of the post-War era is without a doubt Giotto Bizzarrini; he was the father of the 250 GTO and the Lamborghini V12 engine to name just a few of his achievements. For a brief period of time he also built cars bearing his own name. Today we take a closer look at one of these; the Bizzarrini 5300 GT Strada. Although he improved the breed, Ferrari did already produce race winning machines before Bizzarrini joined them like this Ferrari 250 GT TdF.
The great Ayrton Senna entered Formula 1 in 1984 and he looked set to win that season's Monaco Grand Prix, but the race was red-flagged just as he overtook race leader Alain Prost. That year he used the Toleman TG 184 Hart, which was one of the very few privateer machines that was successful in the turbo era.
Duesenberg is one of the best known names in motoring's rich history, but many people have forgotten about the road cars the company produced before they introduced the legendary J. This is highly unfortunate as the Model A and the featured Model X were highly advanced machines in their day. The Model A was the first production car to use an eight cylinder engine and hydraulic brakes. Locke Sedan highlighted today was recently removed from a barn where it had remained for over fifty years and is one of only four survivors of its type.

Brooklands, the world's first purpose build racing track first saw action on June 17th, 1907. This year the hundredth anniversary is celebrated of the track that was the centre of (British) motorsport for thirty years. Unfortunately the main celebration coincided with Le Mans, so we could not attend it, and instead we would like to take a closer look at two of John Cobb's great Brooklands racers; the Napier-Railton Special and the Delage DH V12. With these two he dominated the races on the high-speed outer circuit for many years.
A fur broker by trade, John Cobb was quickly captured by the speed bug and raced a wide variety of large engined machines at Brooklands in the 1920s. At the end of the decade he got a hand on the Delage DH V12 used a few years earlier by Rene Thomas to set the land speed record. In the skilled Frenchman's hands the V12 engined racer was highly successful in sprints and hillclimbs. Cobb continued to use it to great effect and won several races and broke numerous records. When the Delage was finally showing its age, Cobb commissioned local experts Thomson & Taylor to custom build him a new racing car to replace the DH V12. Their chief engineer Reid A. Railton fulfilled all of Cobb's wishes with the 24 litre W12 engined Napier-Railton Special. The silver racer proved even more successful than the Delage as it won many races at Brooklands and broke a grand total of 47 world records and to this day it holds the lap record on the bumpy outer circuit with an average of 143.44 mph. The Napier-Railton Special is arguably the most important surviving British pre-War racing car.