One of the most amazing events of the Pebble Beach week is the Tour d’Elegance.  The Tour takes many of the classics competing for trophies at the Pebble Beach Concours together with past competitors on a winding drive through the Monterey Pensinsula.  The purpose is to ensure that classics not only look perfect, but also run strongly.  Cars that finish the tour get the tie-breaker during Sunday’s judging against competitors that don’t.

Around 11AM classics ranging from the earliest Brass-Era vehicles to supercars from the 1970s pull into Carmel for lunch.  It’s one amazing sight to see thousands of people drooling over dozens of cars worth in excess of $150 million.

Check out the video of the amazing classics pulling in and then storming away after lunch—and try not to drool too much!

It was a busy day running around the Monterey Peninsula. After watching some great cars get offloaded from trailers and into the holding lots for the Russo and Steele and RM Auctions, we headed off to Pebble Beach for the Blackhawk Exposition.

The Blackhawk Exposition is a free event (assuming you pay to get through the 17-Mile Drive gates, or be the proud owners a media pass). The reason it is free is simple–it is essentially the world’s finest used car lot. All these amazing blue-chip collector vehicles sitting on the lawn are for sale.

Blackhawk has something for everyone–at least everyone with at least six-figures to spend. I’m greeted by a rare 1954 HRG Twin Cam Sports Racer–one of three built. Unlike earlier cycle-fender HRGs, this one was built with a cool aerodynamic body and four-wheel disc brakes to compete in Le Mans. It was the second to last HRG ever made. Blackhawk’s asking price is $450,000.

Continue reading after the jump.

Continue reading "Pebble Beach Day Two: Blackhawk Exposition" »

First Budweiser, now this. The Wall Street Journal reports that the weak dollar is allowing Europeans to come over and buy all their cool classic cars back. The auctions in Monterey this weekend are expected to be dominated by European buyers, and many cars are likely to be shipped back overseas. These things do come in cycles, though. For example, "Japanese collectors also bought cars during the local economic boom of the 1980s, but many were sold back to U.S. collectors during Japan’s recession in the 1990s."

But according to the New York Times, American muscle is largely being left alone. "Ahead of the Monterey auctions, dealers are speculating that less expensive American cars will be a tougher sell than European sports cars simply because there is not an international market flush with euros for big, thirsty American cars of the 1950s and 1960s." Hey, that’s fine with me.

Pebble Beach might be known for collector cars, but while walking the Blackhawk Collection exhibit this afternoon, I found Hyundai’s new production Genesis sedan and prototype Genesis coupe just sitting there on the side of the back lawn. The sticker on the window even identifies the car as a prototype. 

This Genesis coupe is far and away the most beautiful car Hyundai has ever created. Based on what it looks like in the flesh, Hyundai has a real winner on its hands.

Continue reading "Spied at Pebble Beach: Genesis Coupe" »

This weekend is Monterey, which means a jam-packed weekend–Monterey Historics, Pebble Beach Concours and the Quail gathering plus all of the auctions, automobilia sales and so on. Basically, we’re talking total car overload. It’s probably the only place where you’ll see multiple Ferrari Enzos waiting at the same red light.

And if you’re headed out there, stop by our party tonight (Thursday evening). We’ll again be hosting a little get-together at the Baja Cantina and Filling Station. It’s located right next to the Quail. I guarantee that you’ll see lots of cool cars there.

There are very few things that can get me out of bed at 5 A.M. A plane flight to cover the many car events on the Monterey Peninsula in California is one of them.

The so-called Pebble Beach week is the most important group of collector vehicle events in the world.  It is anchored by the world-famous Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance on Sunday, but there are dozens of events, big and small, leading up to Pebble. Some die-hard collectors even shipped their prized cars to Seattle a couple weeks ago to tour down over the course of many days.

Before even getting on the plane, the Sound Classics team got our media credentials in line to bring CarDomain members coverage of the Monterey Historics Vintage Races, Concorso Italiano, Russo and Steele Auctions, Goodings Auctions, RM Auctions, Pebble Beach Concours, Pebble Beach Tour d’Elegance, and the Pininfarina Rolls-Royce Hyperion unveiling. We brought our cameras and video-cams, and despite being sleep-deprived and forced to drive an abysmal rented Hyundai Elantra (we forgot to beg for a cool press car), we were ready to rumble. Continue reading…

Continue reading "Pebble Beach: Day One" »