RECORDS TUMBLE AT FESTIVAL SALE
Nothing adds more to the value of a classic than provenance, as proved by a number of high-profile lots at Bonhams’ Goodwood Festival of Speed sale on 13 July.
Chief among these was the 1961 Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato, 2 VEV. Raced in 1961 and ’62 as a quasi-works car at Le Mans and Goodwood, as well as drives by Jim Clark, it had been in single-family ownership since 1971. After a £7m opening bid, it was soon hammered down for £10,081,500, the day’s highest figure and more than twice the £4,593,500 achieved by the second-placed, ex-scuderia Ferrari 1932-’34 Alfa Tipo B (C&SC, July).
Also offering impeccable provenance was a 1957 BMW 507 owned from new by the late John Surtees. Estimated at £2-2.5m, it hit an amazing £3,809,500 to establish a new record for the model as the gavel fell to a round of applause. Another lot with links to an F1 champion, a 1965 Lotus Cortina with Clark history, fell short of its £200-250k estimate at £191,900, but was well clear of the £32,200 raised by another ’65 example.
James Bond kudos pushed the Aston DB5 driven by Pierce Brosnan in Goldeneye to £1,961,500 (£1.2-1.6m), while a modified 2014 Land Rover Defender from Spectre made an estimate-busting £365,500 (£220-250k) – over 10 times the £33,925 achieved by a similar 2015 model with no 007 links (£18-24k).
The greatest shock was the shabby Us-spec 1977 Porsche 911S from Scandinavian TV series The Bridge. It did look wonderfully period in Jäger Grün, but few imagined it would raise £141,500 for charity Wateraid (£20-30k).
Other highlights included a 1931 ‘Blower’ Bentley – one of the original 50 – that made £2.02m, plus a 1964 S3 Continental with ‘bobtail’ body, once owned by Englebert Humperdinck; at £124,700, it smashed its £80-90k estimate.