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If you love British cars this is the place to be the last Saturday in September – the 24th. The Rocks State Park 4H Camp is an excellent country setting in rural Harford County, MD. Bring a picnic basket or purchase your lunch at the show and join the MGs of Baltimore for what has always been a superb show. Bring your parts shopping list for your ongoing renovation projects or your Christmas wish list for regalia and accessories. At MGs on the Rocks you will find: A field full of British cars in a casual park setting Lots of vendors of new and used parts. A great selection of various British cars for sale. An unlimited supply of expertise on whatever technical or restoration problem you have. Classic British Invasion Era Music Pit Beef Sandwiches and other treats from […]

This time last week, MG Motor’s new SUV, the MG GS, went on sale. Since then almost 40 have been registered, orders have been taken, deposits are being made and handovers are just around the corner. Customers looking to bag themselves this fantastic new model may not know that MG invited the public to be part of the creative process earlier this year.

Aston Martin today announces a limited series production of the exhilarating Vanquish Zagato Coupe; the latest creation from its long-standing partnership with the prestigious Italian design-house Zagato. The Vanquish Zagato Concept was unveiled to great acclaim at the prestigious Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este at Lake Como, Italy in May 2016. Thanks to unprecedented customer interest, a strictly limited production run of 99 cars will be built to order at Aston Martin’s production facility in Gaydon, England.

I met Ian Crawford and Emilee Coomes in Louisville, KY last week. What great folk! While talking with Ian he mentioned that Emilee had written a story about their road trip to The Mitty a few years ago. I am honored to publish her story her. Oh, and thanks for the beer. 😉

From “Men and Motors” we have the very first Triumph TR5 off the production line brought along to the Classic & Sports Car Show by Nick Goldthorpe from ‘Classic Motor Cars Ltd’.  Yes, the very first one, and a beautiful survivor. The TR5 was little more than a one year only car, very late 1967 to 1968, and was really just a stopgap between the aging TR4 and not quite ready TR6. As such, it had the body styling of the former car and the six-cylinder engine of the latter. In the UK the car was petrol injected while in the USA it was carburetted and known as the TR250. Seems our US regulations couldn’t quite handle the fuel injection – or maybe it was the other way around. These TRs have gone up dramatically in price recently, leading me […]

Jaguar’s new F-TYPE SVR, 200mph-capable supercar and the world’s most demanding race circuit, the famous Nürburgring Nordschleife, are now available to be experienced together with the launch of the ‘Jaguar Co-Pilot Nordschleife’ programme. This exciting new offer gives visitors and fans the opportunity to experience the thrill of Jaguar’s fastest-ever series production car from the passenger seat on the circuit famed as the ‘Green Hell’. Customers booking their place for a flying lap in the F-TYPE SVR will be amongst the first to experience its power, speed and enhanced dynamics package around the 12.94-mile (20.83km) Nordschleife circuit.

The introduction of a new Aston Martin engine is always something special. When that engine has been created for a new Aston Martin model it’s a true landmark. Today at the Aston Martin Engine Plant (AMEP) in Cologne, Germany, just such a landmark has been reached with the DB11’s new 5.2L twin-turbo V12 entering full production. Designed in-house this new engine develops 608PS and 700Nm of torque, making DB11 the most powerful production DB model ever. It’s also the fastest and most accelerative, too, with a top speed of 200mph and a 0-62mph time of just 3.9sec., while intelligent cylinder bank activation and stop-start technology ensures that potency is matched by greatly improved efficiency.

Land Rover stopped people in their tracks last week as a standard Discovery Sport towed three luxury train carriages weighing more than 100 tonnes along a railway track demonstrating its towing capability. The 10km journey through the Rhine region of northern Switzerland put the compact Discovery Sport’s pulling power to the ultimate test. Though the Discovery Sport has a certified maximum towing weight of 2,500kg (2.5 tonnes), it was able to pull 60 times its own weight, powered by Jaguar Land Rover’s 180PS Ingenium diesel engine providing 430Nm of torque. In addition, the Discovery Sport benefitted from Land Rover’s portfolio of towing and traction technologies such as Terrain Response, Tow Assist, Tow Hitch Assist and All Terrain Progress Control – a semi-autonomous off-road driving system that automatically manages engine output and braking, to complete the tow.

The 54th National Austin 7 Rally takes place at Beaulieu on Sunday 3rd July and holds one of the longest unbroken runs for a one-marque club using the same venue for its annual event. For one enthusiast the event will mark a particularly significant milestone. Bertie Fowler, who bought his first Austin 7 in 1966, will be attending his 50th rally. He purchased the 1936 ‘Nippy’ (one of the relatively few production sports models that Austin made) at the age of 19, negotiating the £90 deal in darkness by the Derby Grandstand at Epsom racecourse. It was, he says, ‘the best buy I ever made’. Years of happy motoring followed, even in the face of what Bertie describes as ‘the usual Nippyisms’ of the doors flying open when negotiating fast corners. The car came off the road in 1976 and […]

Aston Martin Racing came away from the 84th running of the Le Mans 24 Hours leading the FIA World Endurance Championship GT Manufacturer’s title. After running a near-faultless race, both the #95 and #97 GTE Pro entries finished in fifth and sixth place respectively. With the team focused on ensuring a safe and steady pace throughout the early stages of the race and throughout the night, each of the entries were tasked to make progress at dawn. The #95 Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GTE, driven by Nicki Thiim (DN), Marco Sørensen (DN) and Darren Turner (GB) finished fifth, having given a spirited fight to its rivals and stayed in podium contention through the night. However, the cruel nature of Le Mans struck as Turner suffered a right rear puncture in the 20th hour, caused by debris on track. Turner said following […]

Caterham Cars will be one of the stars of this year’s Supercar Event – the 10th anniversary of the charity initiative. The Supercar Event is an annual family-based event which offers fun activates such as supercar and helicopter rides, land hovercrafts and a Stay Safe Driving School for children aged 14 and over. The event runs from over the weekend of July 2/3 at the famous Top Gear track at Dunsfold Park. It will be open to the public from 9am to 4:30pm each day. At the event, Caterham will have the exhilarating, top-of-the-range Seven 620R on display and will offer fans the mouth-watering opportunity of having a passenger ride with a skilled instructor in the car – the most powerful production Seven ever built. The Seven 620R will also form part of the event’s main parade, which travels round […]

The primary purposes of this road trip were (are? I am still on it) to see my friend Gene Gillenwater in Ohio, to attend the MG national meet in Louisville, KY, and to simply get out and drive and see some countryside. I have done all of those, and I am still on the road! The first leg of the road trip took me from Charleston, SC, over some of the worst roads I have ever seen, through North Carolina and a bit of Tennessee up into Virginia. Seriously, the roads in my own home state are the worst I have seen and are in dangerously bad shape. We should be ashamed of ourselves. The second leg of the trip was from Bristol, VA, through Abingdon, VA, because no self-respecting British car fan could pass up going to Abingdon, and […]

In 1960, Colin Chapman sought to identify the most straightforward and uncomplicated way of building a Formula 1 car. The result was his first rear-engined design, the trendsetting Lotus 18. Lotus 18 – Colin Chapman’s U-turn by Mark Whitelock, the new book from Veloce Publishing, charts the 18’s competition history, from its inception, up to 1966 – via sensational victories over Ferrari at Monaco and the Nürburgring. Colin Chapman’s previous attempts at producing a Formula 1 car had been a complete disappointment. Despite being technically advanced, extreme lightness led to numerous structural failures. In 1960, Chapman decided to start with a clean sheet of paper, assessing the basic requirements for a contemporary Formula 1 car, and identifying how to achieve them in the most straightforward, uncomplicated way. The result was one of Chapman’s greatest creations – the Lotus 18 – a […]

The new MINI Cooper John Cooper Works Challenge takes track-driving performance to a new level, while also offering a thrilling on-road driving experience that doesn’t sacrifice everyday comforts and refinement.

Bentley Motors returns to Goodwood Festival of Speed 2016 with a trio of powerful and luxurious UK debuts. The award-winning Bentayga SUV and new Flying Spur V8 S sedan will demonstrate their performance credentials on the Goodwood hill-climb, while both models will also be displayed on the Bentley stand alongside the new Continental GT Speed – the fastest production Bentley ever.

Our Video of the Week (VotW) this go round comes by way of the British Motor Corporation of 1962. It is entitled “Magic Carpet” and is a nice period marketing piece for the MG 1100. The BMC family of 1100 and 1300 sedans were the big brothers to the Mini. Designated AD016, they were badge engineered as Austin, MG, Riley, and Morris to name a few. They were enjoyable little people movers and were the top selling, or one of the top selling cars, in Britain for many years. Although they never reached that same level of popularity here in the US, there did used to be quite a number of them around. Long ago I had  a website devoted to the MG 1100, and although I haven’t updated it in a long time you can still find it at http://justbritish.com/mg1100. […]

Welcome to our new post category – “Road Ink“. The first of this new category is a short video on the innards of a Triumph Spitfire door mechanism. These mechanics are notorious for going out of alignment and even breaking. When this happens, you can no long open the car’s door from the outside. Quite frustrating, trust me! What is even more frustrating is that the fairly simple repair parts are not available for purchase. You either get to fork out over $200 for a complete unit, or attempt for use used or alternative parts. This latter choice is what those of us not made of money would prefer to do, but since this unit was always viewed as a single item by Triumph and BL, documentation is scarce. Hence this video. I just want to take a few moments […]

McLaren Automotive will return to the Goodwood Festival of Speed this summer celebrating race wins and titles spanning more than five decades. McLaren will honour the drivers and championships where the team has claimed the top step of the podium, in the ultimate expression of ‘Full Throttle – The Endless Pursuit of Power’. McLaren House will once again return to the lawns of the Goodwood Estate, with iconic racers displayed alongside the full range of modern-day McLaren models in the Sports Series, Super Series and Ultimate Series. The broad selection of models, spanning more than 50 years of the McLaren name, will be the most extensive display of McLaren models ever showcased, including the new 570GT. As in previous years, McLaren will also be present in the Supercar Paddock with models from each of the three tier range. The recently announced […]