They say you should never meet your heroes. That the reality will never come anywhere near the perception you have built up over the years — after all, how could it? But here I am, shaking hands with the Austrian Oak — Arnold Schwarzenegger himself — and chatting about the UAE while he munches on an enormous chocolate chip cookie. While I would never say he’s a personal hero, what does one say when confronted by a world-famous man whose humongous physical presence has not diminished one iota in his 68 years? I’m unusually tongue-tied and tripping over my words.
I’m in the Bugatti hospitality suite at the 2015 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, and Arnie, who owns a Veyron, has popped in to check out the assembled cars, new and old, that are arranged in a private display. And as much of a privilege as it is meeting the big man, it’s nothing compared to what I’ll be doing less than 24 hours from now, when I will be experiencing what, for many car enthusiasts, is the ultimate luxury. But more on that later.
Pebble Beach is all about unabashed luxury, which is why celebs of Arnie’s stature are comfortable walking around without a bevy of bodyguards or flunkies. If you think his biceps are huge, just consider for a moment the price tags that the cars on display here could wear. There are 219 cars being shown, many worth millions of dollars each, but here visitors can get up close with the cars and personal with their owners. Make no mistake, this is the most luxurious car show on the planet.
Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance (it basically translates from French as “competition of elegance”) started in 1950 to complement the annual Pebble Beach Road Race event, where cars are judged and awarded on their provenance and historical importance, as well as condition.
Nowadays, 15,000 visitors pay $400 (Dh1,470) to essentially walk around a display of old cars while traditional jazz oozes from the PA system.
There’s no doubt that many of the cars on display have been over-restored, with every gram of history removed in the pursuit of perfection, and to an increasing army of fans (myself included), that’s taking things too far. There’s nothing wrong with a few flaws or blemishes, but you only have to look around at some of the ladies present (many at least two decades younger than their husbands, yet still mature enough to warrant some restoration work of their own), to realise that some people just don’t know when to stop.
There’s more to the event and its people than meets the eye, however, because there’s some serious philanthropy going on in the background. Since 1950, more than $20 million has been donated by participants and attendees alike, in aid of charities that help underprivileged children in Monterey County. It’s difficult to fathom that poverty, hunger and illiteracy could be a problem for children in this part of the United States, but it is. And this most glamorous and prestigious of events plays an important role in addressing those social ills. Perhaps I shouldn’t baulk at the $40 asking price for this year’s poster after all.
At 2pm, the category winners are announced and these priceless artefacts are driven (or sometimes pushed, if there’s a “failure to proceed”) onto a podium where a compère divulges a few details about them and their histories. As the field of entrants has grown over the years, so too has the list of categories, and it takes more than two hours for the winning Best of Show car to be announced. Today it’s a (deep breath) 1924 Isotta Fraschini Tipo 8A F. Ramseier & Cie Worblaufen Cabriolet, owned by Jim Patterson of Louisville, Kentucky. He won in 2010, too, with his 1933 Delahaye D8S De Villars Roadster, so leaves a happy man, indeed.
Before I head back home, however, there’s one last treat in store — one that even a night on the town with The Governator couldn’t hope to match. Bugatti has sold its final (450th) Veyron, and is still many months away from unveiling its successor, but Pebble Beach is rich pickings for future prospects, so the company being here makes sense. As a bookend of sorts, Bugatti has graciously arranged for me to experience not only one of the very last Veyrons but also a 1926 Type 35 — one of the most revered competition cars of all time and undoubtedly the Veyron of its day.
I mentioned earlier about this being the ultimate luxury, but how can that be, when referring to a car that’s basically a stripped-down racer with barely enough room for two occupants and zero weather protection? It doesn’t even have doors.
What it does have, though, is extreme historic significance. The Type 35 is the most successful competition car in history. Hand-built between 1924 and 1927 in Molsheim, Alsace, this model won more than 1,000 races, averaging 14 wins per week in its short heyday. To put it mildly, no car since has come close to being so significant. And I’m here to drive it.
But first the Veyron. The roads in these parts are far from ideal for letting this behemoth off its leash, but that’s not to say this is a waste of time. On the contrary, I can instead marvel at the sheer usability of the thing in normal driving situations. This is the sixth Veyron I’ve driven and still it fries my brain with its engineering magnificence. How can anything be so well resolved at either extreme of the performance spectrum? It beggars belief.
It might share a badge with the Veyron, but the Type 35 could not be more different in its physical make-up. However, the same commitment to extreme performance, the same engineering brilliance, the same derring-do, the same desirability — they’re all present and correct and, as I squeeze into its miniature cockpit next to a racing legend in the form of its custodian for the day, Andy Wallace, I have difficulty coming to terms with what’s happening. Everything is as it was when this glorious automobile was hand-built more than eight decades ago. To start it, you have to pressurise the fuel system with one-and-a-half pulls of a lever to the right of the steering wheel, retard the ignition using a different lever to the left and press a button while hoping for the best. As it thunders into life, you have to keep the revs up, lest it die on you in front of the crowds that have gathered all around in the past couple of minutes.
What follows is two hours of driving nirvana. After 10 minutes or so, I properly relax behind its gargantuan wheel, with Wallace seemingly satisfied that I’m treating this valuable piece of art with appropriate respect. To change gear, I have to manoeuvre my feet in the tightest of spots, press the clutch, blip the throttle and engage the next ratio with as much smoothness as I can muster. All the while, shifting between ratios with a substantial lever that happens to be outside the body of the car. If I can drive this thing, I can drive anything — which is the polar opposite of what the Veyron is all about.
The sounds, the smells, the vibrations, the oil and water leaks — they’re all utterly unacceptable in any modern vehicle.
But surely a luxury is something that you want but don’t need, and by this yardstick, a Type 35 (actually, any Bugatti) is a luxury beyond compare because the experiences they offer come at a staggering price. If you wanted to buy the car I’m driving around California’s Highway 1 in, you’d need to dig deep (on the very rare occasion an original is offered for sale) to the tune of Dh14.5 million.
Soon enough, Veyrons will be considered in the same light and when Bugatti unwraps its next performance icon, its next giant-slayer, you’ll be able to trace its lineage back to this car. It’s at times like this that I have to start thinking of what to tell my wife who’s back at home. How do I manage to convince her that this is actually work?
I can’t. Later in the day I decide to be completely honest and tell her that I’ve enjoyed one of the most magical experiences — one of the ultimate luxuries — of my entire career.
She wrongly assumes I’m referring to my brief meeting with Schwarzenegger (about which she admits to being incurably envious), but no. I’m referring to a couple of hours spent driving an antique car until it runs out of fuel and its floor is liberally coated with fresh engine oil.
She’ll never understand and, yes, I get it. This is, when all is said and done, an elderly car that’s difficult to drive and messes up your trouser legs. But the sheer elation felt when you master its gear change, when you keep its throttle nailed to the floor through corners that unsettle its rear, and when you soak up the sonic magnificence of its eight-cylinder engine at full chat — for me, these are the greatest luxuries of all. The only thing greater would be to actually own the car that’s responsible for all these emotions and, for the fortunate few, that’s a daily reality.
For me, then, even after experiencing Pebble Beach and all its fineries, the ultimate luxury car is nearly 90 years old and doesn’t have windows, a roof or even carpet. This, if nothing else, should show what a broad remit that noun actually has.
