’Twas the week before Christmas, when all through the house, the stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that Santa Petrolhead soon would be there. Lucky you. Here I am. Santa Petrolhead with your list of must-give items for your favourite person’s stocking and some other ideas for your partner and kids.
• Drive a serious car on a racetrack and scare yourself or loved one stupid. The Formula Company (theformulacompany.com) foolishly lets you drive a Ferrari 438 at 200km/h around Sydney Motorsport Park for $795. For $549 you can drive a Radical (better than sex and chocolate malted milkshakes) in Brisbane, the Gold Coast or Sydney.
• “The cars are light, the tyres are slick, if you ain’t out of control you ain’t in control.” Yes, it’s drifting. The rubber-removing art form made famous in movies such as The Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift starring thespians Bow Wow (formerly known as Lil’ Bow Wow) and the only actor with petrol in his name, Vin Diesel. I paid Hi-Tech Drift School (hi-tecdriftschool.net.au) $678 for level one and two classes, but you can drift school at most tracks around Australia or in the outer suburbs of most capital cities on Friday and Saturday nights.
• Drive in the LeMons 24 Hour race. No, not Le Mans in France but very close. While 24 Heures du Mans is the world’s most prestigious car race with more than 90 cars each worth a minimum $5 million, the 24 Hours of LeMons (24hoursoflemons.com.au) has more than 50 cars worth no more than $999. Many are cleverly disguised as German tanks, wine casks and 747s. In 2016 you can LeMon in New Zealand, Queensland, NSW, Western Australia and Victoria for $800 a driver.
The 24 Hours of LeMons, which next year will be held in Queensland, NSW, Western Australia and Victoria.
The 24 Hours of LeMons, which next year will be held in Queensland, NSW, Western Australia and Victoria.
• Drive across Australia in a Shitbox. If driving around a racetrack for 24 hours sounds a bit tedious then you can drive the same car 3500km from Mackay to Hobart in the 2016 Shitbox Rally (shitboxrally.com.au). It’s a lot of outback driving, including the underwater bit across Bass Strait, a lot of on-the-spot repairs, kangaroos, crook coffee and cheap wine, but it’s all nearly worth it at the end.
• Too wild to drive. What happens when you buy yourself a nice Xmas present like a 450kW 1965 Shelby 427 Competition Cobra that was never meant to be near a road and you change the exhaust, change the racing harness for a lap belt and try to drive around the streets of South Carolina? Don Russell did just that. He bought one of only 23 competition Cobras built and on his first drive scared the stuffing out of himself so badly that he immediately sold it to a good racing home. The non-comp versions of these cars sell for about $1m. You will have to wait until next month to buy this stocking filler from RM Sotheby’s Arizona auction; it’s probably worth it if you have a lazy $3m in your back pocket.
450kW 1965 Shelby 427 Competition Cobra
• Steve McQueen in your very own home. Steve McQueen: The Man & Le Mans is a doco (on DVD) about the making of the world’s most boring movie, Le Mans. Boring unless you do have petrol running through every part of your body, or some illegal substance. Le Mans was a movie made without a script and The Man & Le Mans is a doco that reveals that one of the greatest Hollywood legends was just like the rest of us, deeply flawed. The lack of script meant race driver David Piper had to film two versions of a passing manoeuvre. In the second take Piper crashed and lost his leg. He never heard from McQueen again.
Happy Xmas or whatever you celebrate.
