Anyone have 100 Grand I can borrow?

My favorite Mangusta race car, profiled a while back on Automobiliac is suddenly available on ebay!  I want it so badly.

Check it out HERE

Hat tip to Syed.

Our man in the UK visits the RM Auction

Our intrepid London-based contributor Davide de Giorgi filed the following report on his recent experience at the RM Auction:

RM Auctions in Battersea Park was the first Auction I managed to follow from the very beginning and I have to say has been a fantastic experience.

There were some truly amazing cars and the game of "trying to guess the price" kept me glued to the chair till the very last lot. The "feel" of the market seem to apply randomly and sure there were surprises. Most of the cars went for less of the estimate and quite a lot could not be sold. I wouldn't know how it could feel to offer £1,3000,000 for the 1955 Ferrari 750 Monza Spider and hear the reply "sorry, can't let it go for that price". Just another quarter of a million would have done to take home the only 750 Monza without the headrest finn, a car extremely familiar with the chequered flag.

Also unsold the 1966 Ferrari 275 GTB Alloy Berlinetta (£635,000), the stunning and unique 1972 Miura SV (£700,000) and one of my favourites of the day, the stunning 1965 Bizzarrini 5300 GT Strada.

Someone got away with a real deal on the 1958 Lister-Chevrolet "Knobbly". The estimate was reasonably between £460,000 and 590,000, for a car that has spent most of its life on the track and was offered completely restored but with a beautiful patina. Incredibly no one in the room moved a finger until an usual celebrity managed to take it home for £177,500. Sold.

The queen of patina, though, was the legendary Alfa Tipo 33/TT/3 that left Japan for the lower estimate, £525,000. I sure hope to see this monster at the next Le Mans Classic, this car is what motorsport dreams are made of.

Few cars passed the minimum estimate and you should have seen the expression on the face of the bidder when no one added anything to his £8,000 for a 1947 Chrysler Windsor Club Coupe'. The estimate was £25,000 to 32,000. Something like "what? really? where the hell am I going to put it now?"2011 proved the lucky year for the Voisin once again. After the glorification of the C-25 Aerodyne at Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance this summer, it's no surprises that RM's C25 Cimier coupe' went under the hammer for £340,000. The real surprise was the very pretty indeed 1927 Avions Voisin C11 Cabriolet. The estimate of £42,000 to £68,000 was completely wiped out by the final bid of a whopping £117,500. Staggering.

Unsurprisingly the queen of the night was the stunning 1958 Ferrari 250 GT LWB "Tour de France" Berlinetta. The room went silent and I was expecting a new world record when in fact the hammer fell on the 2 million mark. The lower estimate.

Lower than the estimate but still an achievement on its own was the delicate concept of the Ferrari Pinin.  I spent good forty minutes around this car on viewing day because it has always been one of my favourite sedans of all time. It looks quite conventional at first sight but considering it was presented in 1980 it truly is one of the cars that inspired things to come. Being able to sit in it and enjoy the silence of that dashboard sitting at the wheel was truly an experience that will stay with me for a long time.

Was all this worth the £50 entry? Absolutely. In fact considering the fantastic 300 pages catalog, two days of fun and the party with food and drinks on tuesday night turn it into a pretty good deal.

Frank Stella BMW M1 goes on the block at Bonhams this August

It's times like this I wish I was a Russian oligarch.  Or any sort of oligarch for that matter.  In addition to the famous BMW 3.0 CSL that Frank Stella painted in graph paper livery for BMW's Le Mans assault in 1976, he also apparently painted an M1 on private commission in 1979.  This makes the M1 in question the only BMW Art Car that will ever be available for private sale, since all the others reside in BMW's permanent collection.  Even more curious is that this painted M1 was in the Guggenheim's collection since 1999, but it was never displayed, as far as I know, except to be driven in 2003 for an exhibition run.  With an estimate of $450,00-$600,00 I'd say this car is a bargain by Art auction standards.

Via the NY Times Wheels Blog

Upper photo credit: Phil Patton

Heuer Racing Chronographs under the gavel at Bonhams

Today in London, Bonhams will be auctioning off a remarkable array of vintage (Pre-TAG) Heuer watches collected over many years by Arno Haslinger, who literally "wrote the book" when it comes to collecting these fine Swiss timepieces.  Inextricably linked with motor racing, Heuers are, for me, the coolest vintage watches you could wish for.  Enjoy this video of Mr. Haslinger talking about his 4 favorite watches from his extensive collection.

For my money, I'll still take a vintage Monza!

via Hodinkee

"It is so choice..."

"...If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

Those were the famous words of Ferris Bueller describing his friend's father's 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California. Well, now the actual movie car is up for auction.  I think we all remember that heartstopping moment when the Ferrari is sent crashing through a plate glass window and into the ravine below.  In fact that car, as well as this one, were both replicas built by the studio specifically for the film (there were 4 replicas total).  A faithful recreation on the surface, the car is actually bodied in fiberglass, and propelled by a 4.7L Ford 289 V8 and automatic transmission.  The auction's estimate is 40 to 80 thousand pounds, but I just have a feeling the car could sell for far more than that because even though it is not a real Ferrari, this machine is basically the most famous car in cinema (up there with the DeLorean in Back to the Future) and as such is a desirable piece of pop culture history.  I hope it goes to the Peterson Museum in LA for their Hollywood cars section! Click here for the link to the full auction item description.

On a side note, the house in which the car was kept in the movie (formerly belonging to real car collector Ben Rose) has also been on the market.  Perhaps one lucky fan can own them both!