Cars

This is the third generation of what BMW calls its Sports Activity Vehicle (or SAV), and what everyone else calls a big SUV or 4x4. The first version arrived in 1999 and the ethos hasn’t changed since then: the X5 prides itself on offering decent off-road ability, generous interior space, and – what perhaps sets it apart from most competitors – genuine driving pleasure, despite its height and weight. 

To date, ‘Caratsch’ still holds the record for the best time over the 136-corner route

Between 1922 and 1934, the Swiss ‘Klausenrennen’ was by far the most demanding hillclimb of its day. It was not only Caracciola who accepted the challenge: the likes of Hans Stuck and Tazio Nuvolari also braved the 21.5km route, snaking through the hills from Linthal up to the base of the Clariden mountain.

As you might remember, we’ve already sampled the F-type in both Pamplona and the surroundings of Lake Geneva – but a true alpine tour, with sharp bends and steep inclines, was still absent from the test portfolio. Consequently, we opted for the craggy peaks of the Sexten Dolomites in South Tyrol, with the route taking us from Zürich via Davos, the wondrous Fluela pass and Lower Engadine, over the Val Münstair, through Merano and Bolzano, and culminating at the Three Peaks Nature Park at the base of the mountains.

From Aston to Zagato, Autosalon Isartal can offer you a vast choice of daily-drivers from the last four decades; but if you insist on holding out for a Porsche, you'll find Carreras and Turbos from the F Series to the 997 - or so we discovered when we recently visited the showroom. 

Not only was the Silver Wraith the first Rolls to be produced following the end of WWII, it was also the last model offered solely in ‘chassis-only’ form to leave the factory – although sister brand Bentley offered a factory-bodied comparable in the form of the Mark VI Standard Steel Saloon.

Frank Dale founded the company in 1946 as the world’s first independent Rolls-Royce and Bentley specialist. His two stepsons Ivor and John Gordon were to join the company the following decade, giving the company not only a longer name, but also a future lineage through which the ever-expanding company would operate to this day. In addition, James Crickmay joined the company in 1980, and now shares directorship with his son, Giles.

In the weekend’s main event, the six-hour endurance race, Simon Hadfield and Leo Voyazides took a sterling victory in their Ford GT40, seeing off several other GT40s, Mustangs, Porsche 911s and Austin-Healey 3000s. Not only did Brown capture the epic race, but also the rather wet victory celebration afterwards.

Necromancy is a tradition at Rolls-Royce

In the footsteps of the Phantom and the Ghost comes a new spectre: the Wraith. Necromancy is a tradition at Rolls-Royce – it was in 1938 that the first Wraith rolled through the streets of Britain, but the new spook on the block is no fleeting apparition, not with a length of some 5.3 metres and a large-scale price tag topping £235,000. But why are we even talking about the vulgar subject of money? This is a Rolls-Royce, after all, and those who buy one rarely need to ask such irrelevant details.