On page 108 of the April issue of CAR you will find a report on the inaugural Franschhoek Motor Museum Concours and Time Trial held on the museum's grounds in the picturesque L'Ormarins wine estate. Last November, when the event was still merely an idea, I felt honoured to have been asked by the museum's curator, Wayne Harley, if I would be a judge for the planned concours d'elegance. Having never performed this task at an event as prestigious as this was going to be, I excitedly agreed - but as the date drew closer I will admit to a level of anxiety building up. Anyone who has ever attended a concours will know that there is a LOT of prestige attached to success in such competition, and being responsible for helping choose "the best" from an eclectic display of motoring excellence is a daunting task for anyone. If challenged, often it is far harder explaining why a vehicle did not win rather than justifying why another one did. More than one observer commented, "You can make a lot of enemies judging a concours". Ah, so no pressure, then...
Fortunately, however, I was in the company of two experts in these matters, namely the ebullient Chris Routledge from Coys of London and Capetonian Robert Coucher. Coys, founded in 1919, is one of Europe's elite auction houses (whose scale of expertise is not limited to motor vehicles) and Chris is one of the company's three senior auctioneers. He has a huge interest in old cars and acts as a consultant to Johann Rupert's FMM for the acquisition for many of the museum's vehicles. Robert relocated to the UK in 1988 to become editor of Classic & Thoroughbred Cars, then the Bentley magazine before founding and editing the classy Octane magazine, which he does to this day. Chris and Robert have judged on many concours around the world, both independently and together, so the impact of my involvement was under experienced control.
Wow, the judging was more of an eye-opener than I expected. We had agreed beforehand to keep the criteria as simple as possible and take each car in context, be it original, restored or modified. This precluded being chastised for not noticing that so-and-so's 1947 Chitty was fitted with a hexagonal widget from a '48 model so could not possibly be considered original. But with entries ranging from bog-standard Mazda R100 to FMM's majestic 1929 Mercedes-Benz S-Type, weighing-up the merits of each and choosing a winner - viewed in 40-deg+ blazing sunshine all the time under the watchful eye of the owners and giving commentary as we went around - was quite daunting, although Chris' banter over the microphone interspersed with comments from Robert and myself helped keep the atmosphere light.
The handful of museum models included in the mix for variety (apart from the Merc S-Type there was a 1928 Bentley 4½, 1950 Jaguar XJ120, 1956 Mercedes-Benz Gullwing, 1960 Ferrari Nembo Spider, 1961 Aston Martin DB2/4 Spider and 1961 DB4 GT) was ineligible for the main awards, which made our task just a little easier. Toyota sent down a pair of GT's that were at either end of the spectrum: the tiny two-cylinder GT800 and hairy-chested GT2000, both very appealing in bright red paintwork. It was great to see the likes of Peanuts Fouche's Mazda R100, Hein van der Watt's GSM Flamingo and Basil Landau's 1949 MG TC being assessed alongside such exotica as Classic & Performance Car Africa publisher Fred Phillips' Ferrari 365 GTC, Bentley-boy John White's well-used 1927 Bentley, Giorgio Cavalieri's unrestored and base-spec 1973 Ferrari Dino 246 GTS and Jannie Gildenhuys' rare BMW M1.
In the end, a 1-2-3 of 1970 Ferrari Daytona (owned by Dawie Theron), 1937 MG SA (Nigel Sedgwick) and 1968 Chev Camaro (Dave Lyons) was quickly agreed upon by the three of us and, thankfully, our decision warmly accepted by all. With Lord Irvine Laidlaw's Aston Martin DBR2/1, in the hands of John Atkins, taking the People's Choice award (sponsored by CAR and voted for by the attending public) and the Ladies Choice (led by Mrs Gaynor Rupert) falling to Charles Arton's superb 1958 Porsche 356 Convertible D, we ended up with the best of British, Italian, American and German.
Pressure? Loved every minute of it. Roll on the next time.
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