How a Ferrari F50 tested my willpower like nothing else ever has
Gathering classic supercars together is a challenge, but so worth it, says Meaden
There was a time when organising magazine tests was a case of phoning a bunch of press offices and making bookings on a selection of rival press fleet test cars. That’s still true to an extent, but as evo has always reflected industry and enthusiast agendas, so our emphasis has shifted towards featuring modern and not-so-modern classics. In turn, as the variety and abundance of new high-performance cars has shrunk, so our reliance has turned to owners rather than manufacturers.
Issue 346 from earlier this year was a perfect case in point, with a quartet of V8 saloons and estates representing noughties hedonism, and the remarkable quintet of Blower Bentley, Gullwing Mercedes, AC Cobra, Ford GT40 and Lamborghini Miura tracing the origins of the supercar back almost a hundred years.
> Great Ferrari hypercars driven: 288 GTO, F40, F50 and Enzo head-to-head
As you might imagine, getting such an eclectic bunch of cars together is not the work of a moment. There are so many moving parts and so much opportunity for something to go wrong it’s a wonder this issue happened at all. Yet somehow, despite spanners such as last-minute insurance woes that exposed the lunacy of underwriter logic, we managed to pull it off.
Central to this is the car enthusiast community of which we are all part. It never ceases to amaze me how generous and trusting people can be with eye-wateringly precious cars. Of course, I’d like to think that evo has a good reputation and that people might like the idea of their car being featured in its pages, but still my mouth goes a bit dry when I’m calling someone I’ve never met to see if they might see their way to letting us drive and photograph their precious car.
The most surreal example of a loaned car was the fortnight I had a Ferrari F50 in my garage. It was for the 288 GTO, F40, F50 and Enzo story we put together back in 2004 when the Enzo was new. That test remains one of the biggest challenges to put together as all the cars were supplied by private individuals.
I’d managed to track down the F50 owner through another contact. Quite by chance he happened to live ten minutes from my house. After a short telephone conversation, I popped round to his place to collect the car. As it transpired, he was going on holiday, so asked if I’d mind keeping it for a couple of weeks.
For a fleeting moment all manner of thoughts crossed my mind. But in a feat of willpower and maturity quite out of character for the thirtysomething me, I supressed all thoughts of Ferris Bueller-style joy rides and kept the F50 safely locked in my garage apart from when used for the test itself. A missed opportunity perhaps, but imagining all kinds of career-ending scenarios threw a bucket of ice-cold water over any ill-advised urges.
For many of this year's issues we’ll be relying heavily on this community of trusting and benevolent owners as we meticulously chart the evolution of the supercar, decade-by-decade and issue-by-issue, from the 1970s through to the present.
At the time of writing we’ve just completed the ’70s test. Conducted over four days, covering meaningful mileage on challenging roads, it’s a test that I’m proud to say only evo can do. It’s thanks to an enlightened publishing team that believes in quality content and provides the budget to do such epic subject matter justice, but also thanks to the owners – many of whom are evo readers – who unfailing ‘get’ what we’re trying to do, want to share the experience of their cars and willingly give of their time to help make these once-in-a-lifetime tests happen. Sometimes at a moment’s notice. Thank you, RichardM5…
In turn the pressure on us to deliver is considerable and the responsibility of being entrusted with the cars is the cause of a few grey hairs. But the challenge of pulling it all together and the satisfaction of seeing it come to fruition is a buzz of which I’ve yet to tire. Aside from the obvious thrill of getting to drive the cars, it’s my favourite part of the job.
In the almost 30 years since we founded the magazine, this is the most excited I’ve been about what we’re doing since the very early days. As always it’s a team effort. The outstanding work of Aston Parrott and our favourite freelance photographers means the cars will look sensational, while our collective decades (actually more than a century) of road testing experience mean the character and driving dynamics will be described in nerdy-yet-colourful detail. Relating them to our contemporary supercar knowledge should bring context to these legendary machines for those young whipper-snappers not old enough to remember them first time around.
I won’t spoil the surprise of exactly what we’ve got lined up in the next of these Supercar Eras features, but suffice to say I don’t think you’ll see a more complete or spectacular gathering of OG supercars anywhere. You’re gonna love it.
This story was first featured in evo issue 346.
