Trends come and go in hot rodding, but true hot rod style never goes out of vogue. It is hard to define but you know it when you see it. Larry O’Toole has been a hot rodder, magazine editor, photographer, book publisher and author on the subject of hot rodding for over 40 years and he has documented every emerging trend from the entire hot rod world. Who better to bring you the latest in that constantly evolving hobby where styling trends meet engineering ability? Traditional hot rods have been cycled and recycled for many years and each time there is a wave of interest in this style of hot rod, that emulates an earlier time, there is evolution of the breed taking place. “Classic Hot Rod Style”, O’Toole’s latest foray into the worldwide phenomenon of traditional hot rodding brings the reader a feast of photographic images that capture the mysterious, intangible ingredient that defines a stand-out hot rod. Even the most die-hard of hot rod fans will struggle to describe what it is that sets such hot rods apart from the rest, they will pause and tell you it is that certain something that is inherent in their design – it’s that “Classic Hot Rod Style”. Gathered together in this fabulous full-color production is a thoroughly researched essay on the evolution of the Classic Hot Rod Style that makes the cars featured throughout the book perfect examples of the breed. This descriptive story is followed up with in-depth features on many such examples with full details on what their owners used to assemble their dream hot rods, together with hundreds of clear photographs that let you see inside these Classic Hot Rods. Finally a pictorial gathering of dozens more examples of the breed let you see where hot rodding is headed in the future. All have been selected for their contribution to that certain something that sets them apart from the pack, it’s that Classic Hot Rod Style that every hot rodder loves.
The Audi R8 was the first in a line of world-beating sports-prototype cars from the Ingolstadt marque which would dominate Le Mans, and would see Audi remain at the forefront of international sports-car racing for over 15 years.
If such an award could go to a machine, Audi ‘R8-405’ – the car featuring in this book – was surely the ‘Man of the Match’ for the 2000 Le Mans 24 Hours. In the end it would finish second, behind one of its team mates which had a far less-troubled run, but it was not for want of trying by Allan McNish, his co-drivers Stéphane Ortelli and Laurent Aïello and their mechanics.
The Audi R8s would go on to dominate endurance racing for a further five years. The cars had already shown what they were capable of by finishing first and second on their debut, in the 12 Hours of Sebring in March 2000.
At Le Mans, apart from a brief aberration when a Panoz led under a full course yellow, ‘R8-405’ led the race for six hours. Trouble then intervened, but the car’s drivers never gave up, McNish setting fastest lap of the race in the morning still chasing his team mates Frank Biela, Tom Kristensen and Emanuele Pirro in the eventual winning sister car. That car would soon be on its way to Audi’s museum, but ‘R8-405’ would race on in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), driven later that year by Biela and Pirro and winning at Texas Motor Speedway and Las Vegas.
By the end of the season, ‘405’ and the other 4-series 2000-season R8s would be rendered almost obsolete by Audi’s introduction of a direct-injection engine for its new 5-series R8. That did not stop ‘405’ from competing for a further year in the ALMS, albeit in private – Champion Racing – hands, with regular drivers including Andy Wallace and Johnny Herbert. Despite its tender years, it would later go on to qualify as an historic car, and a host of new opportunities opened up as it became one of the most raced of all the R8s.
In 2020 the car was acquired by enthusiast Martin Halusa with every intention of taking it back to Le Mans in the future for the biannual Classic races.
The enthralling story of ‘R8-405’ is told in fascinating detail in this book, supported by a stunning array of photographs showing the car in action in its two years of ‘period’ competition, together with a gallery of fine studio images showing this ‘Great Car’ as it is today.
The inspiring, heart-pumping true story of soldiers turned cyclists and the historic 1919 Tour de France that helped to restore a war-torn country and its people.
On June 29, 1919, one day after the Treaty of Versailles brought about the end of World War I, nearly seventy cyclists embarked on the thirteenth Tour de France. From Paris, the war-weary men rode down the western coast on a race that would trace the country’s border, through seaside towns and mountains to the ghostly western front. Traversing a cratered postwar landscape, the cyclists faced near-impossible odds and the psychological scars of war. Most of the athletes had arrived straight from the front, where so many fellow countrymen had suffered or died. The cyclists’ perseverance and tolerance for pain would be tested in a grueling, monthlong competition.
An inspiring true story of human endurance, Sprinting Through No Man’s Land explores how the cyclists united a country that had been torn apart by unprecedented desolation and tragedy. It shows how devastated countrymen and women can come together to celebrate the adventure of a lifetime and discover renewed fortitude, purpose, and national identity in the streets of their towns.
Few, if any, Jaguar XK120s can have enjoyed a more fascinating and varied life than chassis number 660725. Just under two-thirds of the total production was allocated to the Roadster, which had caused such a stir at the 1948 London Motor Show. Of that, 660725 was one of just 1,173 right-hand-drive Roadsters constructed.
Apart from now being the longest-serving XK120 owner, I also consider myself the most fortunate, lucky, accidental, blessed, providential – call it what you will – owner. Why? Because no fictional script writer could have come up with the number or variety of experiences, both dangerous and funny, in so many different countries and environments, that any combination of car and man would experience together.’ Bob Henderson, January 2013
For almost 50 years RM Merchant has produced stunning designs for automobiles. What sets Merchant apart from his contemporaries is that he creates new automobile designs that emulate the styles and techniques of the great automobile stylists and illustrators of the 1920s and 1930s–designers like Alan Leamy, Gordon Buehrig, Harley Earl, George Lawson, and Raymond Loewy. This book pulls together for the first time 245 of Merchant’s favorite drawings.
