You wouldn’t hear the pounding riff of ‘Whole Lotta Love’ introducing cars at a Revival sale. However, Bond St met Broadway at Bonhams’ 2008 Quail Lodge event. The 1960 Jaguar E2A topped the sellers at $5,067,500 but the Classic Driver pick of the catalogue was the ex-James Garner AIR 1967 Chevrolet Corvette L88 Competition Convertible.

Driven onto the block by none other than original team driver Dick Guldstrand, the immaculate, Le Mans Blue FIA GT car sold for $744,000. As part of a two-car entry at Daytona in 1967 that out-qualified all other entries in class, the car was the only team finisher - albeit in a lowly 29th place. It looked utterly superb, both in the marquee and at the Monterey Jet Center event a few days before.

Guldstrand was in fine fettle, too, spinning the wheels on the ramp and enjoying lively Q & As with the urbane Jamie Knight, teamed-up with straight man Malcolm Barber on the rostrum.

The restoration project 1939 Talbot-Lago T150 C SS sold, and sold well at $4,847,000 (including buyer’s premium, as all our prices do). A car that will, no doubt, receive the ‘full treatment’ in the paint and trim shops of the USA, its high price surprised (and impressed) the cognoscenti. Well done Bonhams.

And congratulations, too, for the $4,957,000 achieved by the 1960 Jaguar E2A. Despite pre-sale forecasts of ‘$7m’, this must be the correct price for a totally original car that needs an extensive programme of race preparation and safety checks prior to a return to the tracks.

It wasn’t all success; non-sellers included both Ferrari 275GTB/4s, with one of them bid to $1.6m (a figure far higher than that achieved by similar cars sold by Gooding and RM). The 1961 Aston Martin DB4 GT also failed to sell, and so did the Ferrari shooting brakes.


However, other cars finding new homes worthy of mention include the 1965 Porsche 356C 1600SC Coupe ($139,000), the 1969 Lola T163 Sports Racer ($150,000), and the 1930 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 Gran Sport Spyder ($1,107,000).

Billed as 'the most famous Lagonda of all', the 1936 Lagonda LG45R Rapide went for $1,382,000. In all, the sale grossed $21.7 million.

Mark Osborne, VP and Director of the Motoring Department at Bonhams & Butterfields commented post-sale:

"This year's stellar sale was another great effort put forth by our International Motorcar Dept. We've proved again that cars of provenance, the best of the best, continue to attract strong interest. With more than three world records established at this sale, the collector car market is alive and well."

Please CLICK HERE to see the full results for the Bonhams & Butterfields at Quail Lodge Sale.

We have also put together a complete overview of the 2008 Bonhams & Butterfields/RM/Gooding Monterey sales by marque and model. This can be viewed here on Classic Driver.

Text: Steve Wakefield
Photos: Gooding & Company / Classic Driver

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