Compiled by Randy Leffingwell It’s time for Round 2 of the 2020 automobile auctions, during which we learn whether Monterey 2019 and Arizona 2020 were
Has it finally happened? Have there been so many auctions so heavily loaded with Porsches over the past decade that there are very few left
Bonhams, Gooding and Company, and RM Sotheby’s are offering quite an array of Porsches across the Monterey Peninsula. They range from the very earliest one—the
Photos by: Brian Rozar In the racing car world, there are prototypes, then “production models”, and finally the highest “improvement on the existing art,” to
Photos by Brian Rozar American Express, in its Departures magazine for May/June 2019 has caught on to something automobile enthusiasts and collectors have known for
On 10 April 2019 a gas leak in the Brightleaf District of Durham, North Carolina, led to an explosion and fire that killed one individual
Compiled by Randy Leffingwell Amelia Island promises to be a rich, full weekend of Porsche offerings. Below you will find our usual listing of cars
Fort Lauderdale Auction Results Compiled by Randy Leffingwell RM Sotheby’s Fort Lauderdale Auction Results 29-30 March 2019 Greater Fort Lauderdale/Broward County Convention Center 1950 Eisenhower
While researching for a book I am writing I stumbled on an item in the July 1962 issue of Road & Track in their monthly
All prices quoted here are without buyers commissions or applicable taxes. The website www.hammerprice.com contributed to this reporting. RM Sotheby’s Paris Auction Place Vauban Paris,
Amelia Island promises to be a rich, full weekend of Porsche offerings. Below you will find our usual listing of cars on offer from Bonhams,
With this issue, Road Scholars Magazine starts its fifth year. If you’ve been with us since 2015, we are deeply grateful to you, and we
Compiled by Randy Leffingwell All prices listed reflect the close-of-sale figure when the auction hammer fell. These do no include buyer’s premiums or other taxes
RM Sotheby’s Paris Auction Place Vauban Paris, France 75006 6 February 2019 For further information: information@rmsothebys.com Preview: Tuesday, 5 February 2019 10:00 – 20:00 Central
It will be an interesting kickoff to the auction season in Scottsdale this week with a heightened sense of uncertainly during a partial government shutdown and
Happy New Year! We hope you all enjoyed happy holidays. We start out 2019 as we have each of our four years so far, with
Bonhams The Scottsdale Auction The Westin Kierland Resort & Spa 6902 East greenway Parkway Scottsdale, Arizona 85254 17 January 2019 Previews: Tuesday 15 January 2019
The Petersen Automotive Museum Auction 6060 Wilshire Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90036 For more information: info@rmsothebys.com Preview: Friday, 7 December 2018 10:00 a.m. to 6:00
There’s news. As you all likely know, Porsche introduced its next generation 911 – type-named the 992 – in Los Angeles on Wednesday, 28 November, at LA Automobilia, the Los Angeles auto show. The car has appeared in more spy photos than most celebrities fear have been made of them. What’s more, Porsche hosted…
The Petersen Automotive Museum Auction 6060 Wilshire Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90036 For more information: info@rmsothebys.com Preview: Friday, 7 December 2018 10:00 a.m. to 6:00
Most of you are aware that RM Sotheby’s conducted an all-Porsche auction at the Porsche Experience Center in Atlanta, Georgia. Immediately following this note, please read our regular commentator Kevin Watts. Our sister publication Road Scholars Insight sent out an e-mail blast on the morning of the sale with Kevin’s previews and prognostications, and he addresses those observations…
RMSotheby’s The Porsche 70th Anniversary Sale Porsche Experience Center Atlanta One Porsche Drive Atlanta, GA 30354 Preview: Public: Friday, 26 October 2018 10:00am – 5:00pm
By everyone’s accounting, Rennsport Reunion VI was the best of all six. It drew a crowd of some 81,500 faithful to Monterey’s WeatherTech Raceway –
RMSotheby’s The Porsche 70th Anniversary Sale Porsche Experience Center Atlanta One Porsche Drive Atlanta, GA 30354 Preview: Public: Friday, 26 October 2018 10:00am – 5:00pm
Welcome to a very fat – well, long – September issue of Road Scholars Magazine. The post-Monterey coverage always gives us plenty to talk about and we are happy to start with our regular commentator Kevin Watts giving us his observations and opinions on the auctions.
Next we move into the feature content, going first to Sean Smith’s entertaining second installment telling of Joel Rosenblatt’s Targa tales crossing the U.S. on the way to his…
The Annual Monterey Porsche Auction Frenzy & Spectacular may have seemed a bit subdued around July 4th when we compiled the preview we published soon after that. Since then, consignees emerged from their garages and the woodwork, filling out catalogs with all variety of interesting autos.And the auction weekend has proven to be anything but sublime. Ridiculous? No evidence of that yet, but…. Perhaps you can best think of another word to describe what happened?
We’ll get right to the point: The five auction houses offering cars on the Monterey Peninsula have listed – to date – 134 Porsches for sale. That’s not a record however; one year quite recently had nearly two dozen more. But then this is early August and at least two of these houses
The Annual Monterey Porsche Auction Frenzy & Spectacular may have seemed a bit subdued around July 4th when we compiled the preview we published soon after that. Since then, consignees have emerged from their garages and the woodwork, filling out catalogs with all variety of interesting autos.
The obvious stars are David Gooding with a 1955 Typ 550-0053, Dana Mecum with a 1958 Typ 550A-0141, and RMSotheby’s with a 1957 Typ 550A-0116.
We all may be in denial. Wait! Is it really…that time? Already?
The verdict is yes it is. You had better have flights and rental cars and hotel rooms booked by now. And tickets and dinner reservations and…if you’re shopping…letters of credit on file. The good news is we have other things to show you before we remind you to confront the calendar.
Compiled by Randy Leffingwell The Annual Monterey Porsche Auction Frenzy & Spectacular seems a bit subdued this year. Admittedly, we compiled this list shortly after
If the paint scheme on the car in this Le Mans pits photo looks familiar, it should be. Porsche used it once before on a legendary Typ 917 racer during the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1971. The car had controversial – but more aerodynamic – bodywork. Inside Porsche, it had the nickname “Big Bertha.” Styling chief Tony Lapine hated its bloated looks and asked competition director Ferdinand Piëch if they really had to race it. Lapine reported years later this Piëch replied, “Yes, but you can paint it!” When the transporter doors opened at Le Mans…
Bonhams: The Monaco Sale “Les Grandes Marques à Monaco” Sale: 11 May 2018 18:00 on, C.E.S.T. Subject to buyer’s premium of 15% plus VAT Sale
It’s spring, seemingly everywhere. Even in the deepest darkest reaches of central Massachusetts where my friend George Reilly reported a snow storm just a few
Bonhams: The Monaco Sale “Les Grandes Marques à Monaco” Previews: 10 May 2018 10:00-18:00 C.E.S.T. 11 May 2018 10:00-18:00 C.E.S.T. Sale: 11 May 2018
Over the past months a number of new, significant books have appeared. We’ll show you five we think are particularly noteworthy – and well worth
We chose to delay our “delivery” date to till after dreaded tax day so you might find something enjoyable to distract you. In our
As you probably know, the threat of rain upended the schedules for Amelia Island events in early March. Concours founder Bill Warner chose to shift
I hope that by the time you see this March issue, a number of you who came to Los Angeles for the annual literature and swap meet – or Trash & Trinkets as a good friend calls it – you also will recognize the structure shown at the top of the page in this photo Randy Wells made on opening night. This is the Petersen Automotive Museum and it is home to The Porsche Effect. You’ll read about this exhibition inside this issue.
Auctioneers around the Western Hemisphere continue to renew their faith in Porsche cars as a viable element for their auction catalogs. This list, comprising three auctions at Amelia Island, Florida, in early March, and three auctions in Paris, France, in early February, list 106 automobiles offered for sale at auction in the past 45 days, 73 at Amelia coming up, and 33 in Paris.
I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain. I’ve seen sunny days…that I’m glad to see again….This is a personal note to start, if you will indulge me. Some of you know I live in Summerland, California, a sweet, strange village sandwiched between opulent and extraordinary Montecito and wonderful and eccentric Carpenteria. We are part of that near-idyllic cluster of towns from Carp through Summerland,
With the 2018 auction year opener now in history books, it’s safe to say little history was made. But observations can be – as hopefully you have read in Kevin Watts’ commentary earlier in this issue. Without further ado, here are the results.
We begin the year with Shock and Awe, a story of Love at First Sight that regular contributor Bruce Sweetman has found for us. In it, we meet Nashville, TN, Porsche mechanic and enthusiast Jay Gould and his startling 1973 911S. From there we return to the Pacific Northwest where Randy Wells wraps up his profile of autocross legend
As you all know, January wastes no time in launching the year long auction frenzy that begins at the end of the third week in Scottsdale and Phoenix. This year, examining Bonhams, Gooding & Company, and RM Sotheby’s, we find 57 Porsches offered, ranging from a 1953 Typ 356 Pre-A coupe supercharged
Welcome back. We hope you survived American Thanksgiving with all its dining table temptations. For our December issue, Randy Wells introduces up to an autocross
While we list only three books, there are many others to consider this holiday season and into 2018. These are three that caught our eyes.
This is strictly a preliminary view of some of the more interesting Porsche vehicles that the auction houses will offer in Arizona. Lot numbers and
Happy Thanksgiving to one and all! Most of us have good reasons to be thankful, not least of which are family, friends, and Porsches. We hope the coming holidays find you celebrating each of these.To get you started, and because for most of us very few days (if not minutes) pass without music in our lives, we bring you a tale of three
Silence. At last! After hours of nearly relentless droning, quiet. For the second time in a week, a raucous engine had shut down; the first time came prematurely after not quite 36 hours. Silence then brought long faces. This second noisy run went on for 96 before the noise stilled. Then came the applause. And cheering. And then the sounds of champagne bottles and beer bottles popping their tops.
“Victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan” came from the pen of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Benito Mussolini’s son-in-law, and written in his diaries during World War II. The better-known aphorism “Success has many fathers, failure is an orphan,” merely paraphrases the original and has made it easier for many to claim it as their own. Such is the nature of ambition and accomplishment.
Editor’s Note: At the risk of bragging, our co-founder and co-publisher Cam Ingram had a pretty good time at the 67th Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance
Compiled and written by Randy Leffingwell Photographs courtesy of Bonhams, Gooding & Company, and RM Sotheby’s At Monterey, there were more than 150 Porsches
This week signals the calm before the storm. The annual excitement at Monterey, Carmel, and Pebble Beach, California, returns, running Monday, the 14th of August through Sunday the 21st. There even are follow-on private events that extend into the week starting the 22nd!
At Monterey, there are more than 100 Porsches available from the five auction companies active that weekend. But that’s only the total as of ten days before the first hammer falls. In the meanwhile, there are sales to report from the U.K…
It’s summer. So much so that the annual PCA Porsche Parade looms large on the calendar this month. Scheduled to open Sunday 9 July in
The auction opened with Auctions America handling the memorabilia lots in the style of a tobacco auction with rapid-fire bid calling. This enabled them to power through more than 60 lots in 90 minutes. Auctions America’s chief…
HAT TRICK!
Sometime before the 85th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans ended, t-shirts began to appear along pit lane: Hat Trick, they exclaimed on the front while the backside listed all 19 overall wins since 1970.
Not everyone was wearing one, naturally. There once again were long faces in the Toyota garages…
Auction Previews and Results Compiled by Randy Leffingwell Photos courtesy of R.M. Sotheby’s RM Sotheby’s Villa Erba Auction Villa Erba Largo Luchino Visconti, 4 22012,
While summer does not officially start until the Solstice on Tuesday, June 20, for many of us in the U.S. and in Europe the summer car event and driving season already has begun. Thus it’s appropriate that in this issue, guest commentator Cam Ingram…
RM Sotheby’s Villa Erba Auction Villa Erba Largo Luchino Visconti, 4 22012, Cernobbio, Italy Preview: Friday, 26 May 2017 10:00 A.M. – 5:00 P.M. Central European Saving Time Sale: Saturday, 27 May 2017 6:00 P.M. CEST Terms: Buyer’s premium is…
Auction Results: Bonhams Spa Classic Francorchamps, Le Circuit d Spa-Francorchamps 21 May 2017 Sale: 1:00 P.M. Central European Savings Time (CEST) Terms: Buyer’s premium is 15 percent of the hammer price. VAT at the rate of 21% will be applied to the buyer’s premium…
In our brief April issue we consider collectibles, what makes a Porsche a desirable possession. Through our regular contributor Randy Wells, we meet about Renée Crist, someone who really knows about collectible automobiles as the collections manager
With this late March issue, Road Scholars Magazine begins its third year publishing. Thank you for reading us and for letting others know about us.
Photos courtesy of RM Sotheby’s and Bonhams RM Sotheby’s Place Vauban Paris 75007 France Sale: 6pm, Wednesday, 8 February The auction was conducted in
Photos courtesy of Bonhams, Gooding & Company, and RM Sotheby’s The auction weekend began with an announcement from Bill Warner, by way of Bonham’s auctioneer
Photos courtesy of Bonhams, Gooding & Company, and RM Sotheby’s The 2017 automobile auction season has begun and Bonhams, Gooding & Co., R.M. Sotheby’s, Barrett-Jackson,
Happy New Year! It’s an especially happy new year for us at Road Scholars Magazine – or should I say, “the award-winning” Road Scholars Magazine.
Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Step right up, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, step right up! As the old carnival barker line goes, “Admission is free,
With the gift-giving holidays just weeks away, it’s important to remember to give yourself something as well. Consider it your hard-earned reward for surviving the
This started the way a lot of magnificent obsessions do: “There was this car.” That sentiment motivated Fritz and Hans Schlumpf, the French textile manufacturers
My two-week research trip to Zuffenhausen delayed this issue. I apologize. I had hoped to finish the issue before I left – just before Thanksgiving
Just in time for the holidays – well, also for the Los Angeles International Auto Show (renamed AutoMobility for 2016) – Porsche has opened its
It’s beginning to look a lot like another year is drawing to a close. We hear from friends around the country who are taking one
A Century of Motoring Jon Pressnell. 2015 Shire Publications. 112 pages. List price $12.95. ISBN: 978-0-74781-510-5 Available on Amazon. This enjoyable small book (it measures
Bonhams Preserving the Automobile The Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum – Philadelphia – October 3rd, 2016 Lot 234: 1978 Porsche Typ 911SC Targa – Estimate: $30,000-$40,000 – Sold
Bonhams: The Beaulieu Sale 3 September 2016 11:00 British Standard Time Beaulieu National Motor Museum Prices include fees calculated in U.S. Dollars. Porsche: Lot #
Wash, clean, wax Battery (replace) Oil Pressure Gauge (repair) Custom car cover (buy) Original wheels, tires, original brakes (find) Original small outside mirror (find) Original
Our lead story for October comes from Bruce Sweetman, who drove his 356 from home near Nashville up to Toledo for the East Coast fall
Bonhams: The Beaulieu Sale 3 September 2016 11:00 British Standard Time Beaulieu National Motor Museum Porsche: Lot # 421 1976 Porsche 911 2.7-liter
Bonhams offered a good eclectic mix of vehicles during its one-day sale near the Quail Lodge and Golf Club. Bids came mostly from buyers in
Monterey week was one of moments, some very big and others almost unnoticeably small. At Bonham’s preview on Wednesday, an old friend, Jared Zaugg –
For many car enthusiasts, August is the month we wait for, we save for, and we plot and scheme for. How are we getting to Monterey?
If you’ve missed the Porsche of your dreams – or are hankering for one you never ever even thought about before now – you have
June 2016 has proven to be a month of one enormous and two merely big histories made. Porsche won its 18th 24 Heures du Mans
We take a few historical looks in this issue, views that, in the end bring us up to coming events. Road Scholars Magazine co-founder, Kevin Watts,
From looking at Road Scholars Magazine in this and the past two issues, you easily might think we’ve fallen in love with Florida, or just
In some senses, the Amelia Island auctions provided bidders, sellers, auction houses, and observers with a bit of a reality check. To continue the metaphor
Bonhams Bonhams kicked off the Amelia weekend with its auction at the Fernandina Beach Golf Club, starting at 10:30am, Thursday, March 10. Longtime Bonhams executive
The three auction houses that traditionally offer cars for sale during the Amelia Island weekend will have a great variety of interesting automobiles available. On
The Scottsdale auction week in 2016 ran late this year. The sales frenzy in Western America that traditionally has ended in mid-January typically gave auctioneers
The photograph here summarizes Scottsdale during auction week 2016. When the sales were done, thunderstorms dumped on the region, dense grey clouds remained overnight and
After five years of price run-up in the auction and collector car marketplace that began in 2010 and peaked in early 2015, the business side
Spoiler Alert: Scottsdale Auctions are Coming! Happy New Year! There’s good news already: If you’re reading this, it means you survived the holidays. It suggests
Carrera 2.7 – The Soul of the Legendary Carrera 2.7 RS Lives on Within the Carrera 2.7 MFI Ryan Snodgrass. 2015 Parabolica Press, Kirkland, WA.
Thanksgiving has passed and we hope you survived not only that day but also Black Friday and the full, amazing sports weekend. With this, our
With this November issue, book reviews return to the magazine. These listings appear in this issue to give those who love you perhaps enough time
Some months back, we published a story titled Remember When the Car Hobby had Seasons? The traditional ones – summer and fall – are in
This October issue arrives on the heels of a great event for Porsche and a disaster for Volkswagen. It’s difficult to completely divorce the two
Just when you thought you were done with the Monterey Peninsula from August, we bring you two souvenirs. Writer/photojournalist Sean Cridland takes us back for
There is something revealing in the fact that six auction houses in Monterey offered more than 150 Porsches for sale. Elsewhere in this issue, we
For generations, legions of enthusiasts have gathered cars of their era, vehicles they admired when they first discovered automobiles and when they first started driving.