Monterey, Wednesday, 14th of August
The Wednesday is usually the busy day at the Auction tents
when the previews for the headline auctions of the big houses are
opened to the public. Early in the morning the press preview at
Gooding started showing the lots of the two day auction on
Saturday and Sunday near the Pebble Beach Lodge as Gooding&
Company is the official auction partner of the concours. As in
previous years several multimillion dollar lots are put together in
the tent with a Bugatti T57 SC Atalante and a Ferrari 250 GT TdF
leading the list. Other remarkable cars in the auction are the
Ferrari 250 GT Competition once raced by De Portago, the one-off
Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona Spider by Michelotti and a nice
patinated Bugatti T35 Grand Prix. As unrestored cars are the
favour of our time it will be interesting what money the DB2
Vantage DHC will bring as this car requires massive work and the
estimate is well in the region of top restored cars.
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From Gooding the journey led directly to its rival in the city centre
of Monterey as RM Auction is again located in the Portola Plaza
hotel. When entering the lobby one is welcomed by the star lot of
this weekend with the Ferrari 275 GTB N.A.R.T. Spider expected
to fetch between 14 and 17 million dollar, this price would be the
highest for a Ferrari at auction. Just around the corner is the
second Ferrari, the 375 MM that also comes from a long time
ownership.
The RM preview is divided in two parts, some of the top lots in the
ball room of the hotel including the last years Pebble Beach
winning Mercedes-Benz 680 S Torpedo by Saoutchik and the
outside park behind the hotel where the rest of the cars are
presented open air. RM also has many high class cars on the
block again and it will be interesting to see whether all the top
lots will be sold as this would mean another increase of the total
results in Monterey after the record year 2012.
After the previews the next date on the program of the day was
the group shot at Laguna Seca. Every year the featured marque is
presented under the bridge between turn 3 and 4, this year a
hoard of racing Corvettes could be seen there. The paddocks also
start to fill up with cars for the weekend races during the Rolex
Monterey Motorsport Reunion.
The day was finalized with the 22nd McCall Jet Center Party at
the Monterey airport. The party brings together some nice planes,
collector cars and good food to make this one of the social events
of the week. As mentioned yesterday the Quail Rally arrived at
the Jet Center as did an Aston Martin Rally that celebrated the
centenary with a tour mainly with modern Astons including one of
the One-77. Other cars of interest were a duo of Zagato, the
Aston Martin DB9 Zagato Volante as presented earlier in London
during the Centenary Meeting and a recreation of the 356
Speedster Zagato that was already shown (in unfinished
condition) at the last years Unique Special Ones Concours. At
about 21:30 the party was finished and most of the visitors
prepared themselves for tomorrow when the concours cars are
first seen on the Tour d´Elegance.
New this year will be the route with a visit at Laguna Seca and
one can hope that all the cars are well prepared as a break failure
at corkscrew in a car just finished restoration the days before
might could be fatale.
Report & images … Peter Singhof
www.ClassicCarPhotography.de
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