Hope you had a happy Xmas, having a great Boxing Day etc, etc, blah, blah. But in more important news we've found the best money making rort, sorry, investment of all time. Yes eighteen readers and one friend this is the gold plated, 100 per cent guaranteed way to easy street or my name's not John Smith.

Folks it's been sitting under your nose, well on your wrist to be exact for all this time. Our red-hot investment tip: watches owned by race car drivers.

Here's the story: you buy a Rolex Daytona in 1968. You inscribe on the back 'Drive carefully me', give it to hubby, Paul Newman (a race car driver and actor), wait 49 years and sell it for $22 mill! Then this month, another Daytona, a 1984 model that Joanne Newman (actor) bought for $940, inscribed again with: 'Drive carefully me', gave it to hubby again, sold for $7 mill at Phillips New York auction.

Same with Steve McQueen (race car driver and actor). As he said: "I'm not sure whether I'm an actor who races, or a racer who acts." But having a watch that was anywhere near him is like owning the Mona Lisa.

In 1971 Steve made a movie, Le Mans, that one reviewer (me) called the world's most boring movie. "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." Even McQueen called it 'a bloodbath'.

Preparing for the movie, Don asked Jack Heuer (as in Mr Tag Heuer) for some stopwatches, timing boards, patches and several models of the Monacos (which retailed for $400 in 1970). Jack certainly knew the promotional possibilities for a watch that most potential buyers found too bulky so were piled up in the warehouse. He sold Don six Monacos. Steve chose to wear the Heuers in the movie because it was the logo the top racers had on their suits.

McQueen was a nightmare on and off the set. No wonder. Soon after his birth on March 24, 1930 in Beech Grove, Indiana, his circus stunt person father walked out. Not long after his alcoholic mother who was a sex worker did the same, leaving Steve in the care of his grandparents.

Haig Altounian, a legend of both cars and bikes, was his personal mechanic. At the end of the movie, McQueen got out of his Porsche 917 and handed his Monaco to Altounian saying "Thank you for keeping me alive all these months." Haig said no but then Steve showed him the back of the watch. It was inscribed with "To Haig Le Mans 1970."

He's been doing it so tough that he reluctantly put the watch McQueen gave him to auction this month. Phillips thought it would go for around a mill, I'm really glad he got $3 mill for it.