Well, he wasn't hurt in the wreck, that is; his teammates (including 5-time DOTS honoree WhatWouldJesseDo) might end up inflicting some bodily harm due to unhappiness over the self-inflicted PIT Maneuver that takes place in the video below. Here you will see the view from the Team Stimulus Package Honda Civic as the incident unfolds.

Jeff comes from a family of wild-eyed racing fanatics, so he got started early. His first car was this '73 MGB, a project he started at the age of 13.

After hot-rodding it with the best of late-80s technology, he began his racing career via autocrossing.

It turned out that the young Jeff had quite a gift for driving. Little did he know that this gift would ultimately lead to years and years of life on the road as a pro racer, followed by a brilliant career as a sculptor.

Kept in the ol' racing scrapbook is this letter to the parents of the then-16-year-old MGB-drivin' hoon. Jeff claims that he really wasn't particularly wild as a street driver back then, and that the racket of his Supertrapp muffler made the "KILLR BE" seem to be going faster than it really was. When you're done reading the Concerned Parents letter, you might enjoy seeing some of the cars Jeff has owned over the years.

Folks,

This note is to let you know that your son is endangering others in this town by his reckless driving. At the very least, you should talk to him about it; before either he kills himself or maims some innocent bystander.

His "KILLR BE" license plate could be very appropriate for the way he drives. He has been seen skidding his car around corners, jack-rabbiting from traffic lights and, most dangerous, passing on the right (at about 60 mph) in a 35 mph zone where the road narrows from 2 lanes to 1.

His driving is down-right dangerous. It isn't cute.

This note is by no means to be vindictive. It is a plea to you to talk to him, threaten him if you need to, to protect the other drivers and pedestrians in our town. So far he has been lucky. If he keeps it up, his luck will run out. It will be on your heads and your hearts when he causes serious injury by this foolhardy behavior.

A concerned parent.

If you prefer being a nitpicker to being merely observant, you might then point out that the British Leyland name existed only from 1968 to 1986, and thus several of these ads fall outside those boundaries as well. But here at Jalopnik, we defy categorization of obscure European machinery!

When you're done here, you might check out our favorite VW ads, then go right on with the Datsun, Toyota, Mustang, Renault, General Motors, and Chevrolet ads.

1972 Triumph TR6 (USA)	1981 Austin Rover (UK)	1966 Austin Mini (Australia)
1975 Triumph Spitfire (USA)	1970 Hillman Hunter (Australia)	1975 Triumph, MG (USA)
1980 Austin Metro (UK)	1977 Leyland Princess (Germany)	1976 Triumph TR7 (USA)
1973 Triumph (UK)	1976 Leyland Princess (UK)	1974 Triumph Spitfire (USA)
1981 Triumph Acclaim (UK)	2003 MG ZR (Spain)	1977 British Leyland (UK)	1970 Simca 1000 (Spain)

This is our third MGB, after this '71 MGB-GT and this '73 MGB (some might say that this super-rare '69 MGC-GT counts as an MGB as well).

The "black bumper" MGs don't get much affection from the purists, partly because of the ugly 5 MPH crash bumpers, partly because of the DOT-mandated tall ride height, partly because of the increasingly horrible British Leyland build quality, but mostly because of the 62.5-horsepower engine. Yes, this car was so miserably underpowered that MG actually claimed a half-horsepower in the rating. However, since this one is a '75, it's exempt from California's emission laws. That means its owner is free to add go-fast goodies to his or her heart's content.

While there was only one European machine in the Gator-O-Rama top 10, the Opular Dependence Team Israel Opel GT grabbed the prestigious Organizer's Choice trophy for the Continent. Not only that, the Saabs avoided throwing even a single connecting rod this time out, which should be cause for rejoicing in the streets of Stockholm
.
Thanks to Myke Toman, Nick Pon, Zerin Dube and Speed:Sport:Life, Anna C of Bikini Racer, the Norwegian Slaabs, Saabs Gone Wild, Prison Break Racing, Team Beermer, LeMons Supreme Court Justice Lieberman, Jackson Williams, and others for their fine photographs.

And that Escort is just one of many great British race cars that VR photographed at last summer's B.C. Historics. Lotus, Sunbeam, Austin-Healey, and MG are all represented, and we get a couple of race Volvos as an added bonus! I've been falling behind on my duty to share VR's great racing photographs, so expect more of this sort of thing in the near future.

Clearly, PNP is taking a cue from the classic National Lampoon cover here, and what vehicle could be cuter than a chrome-bumper MGB-GT? It's like a friendly little puppy, begging you to save it from death! A friendly puppy that spends most of its time at the vet and leaks all over the house, that is, but just look at it!



Whoever is writing Pick-N-Pull's Craigslist ads has a good sense of humor. We see the two possible outcomes to the "you don't buy the car" scenario. One shows the parking spot- complete with oil stain- in which the MG once sat prior to its new owner hauling it away; the other shows The Crusher working up a good appetite with a Volvo wagon entree, with the heavy implication being that the MG will be dessert. Lines like "Buy this car and you will know what you will be doing for many months to come" and "Legendary Lucas Reliability" imply that the writer has at least a passing acquaintance with British Leyland products. Here's a giant screen shot of the original ad, just in case someone snaps up that super-bargain and the ad gets pulled. Thanks to Casadelshawn for the tip!



[Craigslist San Francisco]

[British V8]

You know you're looking at a car deal that should make you run away in terror make a bombshell offer right away when the seller takes the time to pound out a lengthy stream-of-consciousness tirade about the car's problems, then doesn't bother to rotate the photos 90° prior to uploading them. And when you're searching high and low for a nimble mid-engined handlin' machine to disintegrate on totally own the racetrack, you can forget all about the boring MR2 or the way-too-reliable Fiero. Yes, forget 'em! What you need is something Italian, like this 1981 Fiat X1/9 (go here if the ad disappears). Asking price is $600, but the seller has an air of desperation and junkyards only offer $200 for a small car's scrap value, so there's a good chance you'll be able to turn a profit by selling off excess parts… leaving you money to rig up the world's most redneck junkyard-turbocharged Fiat, which should boost engine power from the factory 75 horses up to a block-ventilating track-dominating 150! The engine and transmission allegedly work, and the seller claims there's "plenty of rust but the chasssity of the car is solid!!!" It runs, the chasssity is solid, and the price is right- we can't see a single flaw in this plan!

The X1/9 is a fine LeMons choice, no arguments there, but you can kiss that Index Of Effluency trophy goodbye if some team out-huevos yours by keeping a British car alive for at least half the race, particularly if they manage the feat in a tiny 70s British Leyland sports car. We like the Triumph GT6, the TR7 should come equipped with built-in yellow flags, and you often see Sprites available for dirt cheap… but imagine the glory of getting towed off the track every five laps roaring past the competition in this 1972 MGB-GT (go here if the ad disappears)! You got your Lucas Electrics, your lever-action shocks, your finicky SU carbs, your 50s-vintage pushrod four, and- best of all- that legendary British Leyland build quality, all in one gorgeous Pininfarina package! This one is 600 bucks, but the devoted eBay seller should be able to get back quite a bit of that. You get a "trunk full of parts" and the seller claims the car "has not been started in several years," which might imply that it's capable of starting again. Maybe you'll have enough money left in the budget to put some big swaybars on it, thus avoiding unsightly asphalt marks on the door handles!

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I spotted this B parked while going out to dinner a few weeks back (on the same commercial strip where we saw the '71 Karmann Ghia). The sun was setting and I was using a borrowed camera, but I was able to capture this super-rare machine.


Yes, MGB fans, I know you can make these cars drive pretty well with huge swaybars, sticky tires, and more power... but in stock form they'll get blown away by your average mid-70s Civic.


That Pininfarina design sure is pretty, though! These things sold new for about $3,600 back in the early 70s, which was $1,300 more than a Datsun 510 and about $900 less than a BMW 2002.

1973 was the last year of the small chrome bumpers for US-market MGBs, with monstrous Malaise units adding approximately five tons of ugly to the later car. The Malaise Era got an early start on the MGB's engine for '73, though, with a Yugo-like 79 horsepower on tap from the venerable BMC B engine (yes, the US-spec Yugo boasted- if that's the word- only 68 horsepower, but those extra 11 horses probably don't give the British Leyland product much of a performance advantage over the Zastava machine). Still, I used a '73 MGB-GT as a daily driver for a few years, and it felt quick, even if the reality was otherwise.


This car is in very, very nice condition, with no rust and plenty of shine, and it parks on the street every day. Did anyone ever use these luggage racks for luggage?


Aftermarket steering wheel and shift knob- right or wrong for this car?

The Pininfarina-designed fastback body on the MGB-GT looks great, most of us would agree, but that old BMC B engine left something to be desired in the power department. From personal experience, I can say that an MGB can barely get into triple-digit speeds with a stock B, and the six-cylinder and Rover V8 versions aren't enough better to justify the funky handling. That's why what you need is an MGB-GT whose funky handling is justified... by the presence of a good ol' small-block Chevy. In fact, you need such a setup with the Added Handling Funk of a backyard IRS conversion, such as this 327-powered 1967 MGB-GT (go here if the ad disappears), with a price tag of just $2,500! The 327 is actually a 283 bored out and stroked to 327 specs (because 327 blocks are so hard to find?)... or maybe it is; the seller can't be sure. That won't matter much, of course, because you'll want to drop in a gnarly-ass 406 in it right away... well, that is if the Corvair transaxle can hold up. Yes, a Corvair transaxle, with the driveshaft coming in from the front! Don't fret about build quality, though, because this project was built by a NASA engineer in Huntsville. A small-block powered IRS MGB built by a rocket scientist and then stored for years in Missouri- what could go wrong?

You have to like that MGB-GT, but many of us won't allow our Hell Garages to be contaminated by the presence of foreign steel, plus the Hell-O-Meter™ reading of a lunatic factory hot-rod built in the last desperate throes of a soon-to-be-defunct American automaker may well be higher than that of a vehicle built under the evil spell of the Prince of Darkness. Yes, we're talking Studebaker Avanti here! You think it's impossible to get a project Avanti for anywhere near the same price as that MGB? Bah! You pessimists can just take your best shot at suspending some disbelief here, because I've managed to find this 1963 Studebaker Avanti (go here if the ad disappears) for just a bit more than half the price of the MG! Now, keep in mind that when you get an Avanti for $1,400, you don't get everything. However, the seller says it "has almost all the parts and a fresh engine," and you even get a Lark (not pictured) as a parts car! The photograph doesn't tell us much about the condition, but it's a safe bet that a word falling somewhere on the Adjectival Scale between "Execrable" and "Dreadful" would be pretty accurate. And so many questions unanswered! What kind of "fresh" engine are we talking about here? The 170 six-banger out of the Lark? Or maybe you've won the lottery with this car and you get a perfect NOS supercharged 289 crate motor! The seller claims "it is complete," so perhaps a couple of days of work is all you'll need to hit the road in your souped-up Stude!

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It goes without saying that we love station wagons, and what could be better than a woody station wagon? Why, this pair of Morris Minor Woody Travellers! There's a Buy It Now of just $4500 for this package deal, which is comprised of a '70 from Blighty and a '64 from New Zealand. The '64 runs and drives (well enough to limp onto a trailer, at any rate) and is allegedly 100% complete; the '70 supposedly drove when it got off the boat from the UK, but the seller describes it as a parts car. The '64 is allegedly rust free, and you get three engines and three transmissions with the deal, too. Remember, even though the initial $4500 cost seems like a lot, as the seller puts it: "If you restore one of these woodys, you will have a classic worth thousands of dollars."

Naturally, we have to match one 2-for-1 British car deal with another, but what do you do when there's a big price disparity between them? Well, when you're starting with this pair of MGB-GTs, including one with a Toyota 20R engine swap for only $1500 (go here if the ad disappears), you budget extra money for a big power upgrade! Like, say, this bolt-on supercharger kit, available for just $2695 new! Yes, it's for a 22R, but you'll want to ditch the 20R for the common-as-hell-in-junkyard 22R, anyway- hey, if the car is already set up for the Toyota R, it'll be a bolt-in (unfortunately, a stronger differential that won't vaporize when faced with three times the intended power likely won't be a bolt-in affair). Of course, we can't guarantee a blower kit meant for a Toyota truck is going to fit under the hood of an MGB, but you'll sort that out. What you get with these cars is one sorta complete Toyota-powered '68 and one '73 that's missing some stuff; in the words of the seller, the previous owner "did metal sculpture for a hobby and every time he needed a piece of sheet metal he went out and cut it off this car so it needs a nose." But so what? Build one good car out of the pair, add a blown 22R, and you'll have Ferrari-esque acceleration to go with that Pininfarina-designed body!

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Sure, you could get a factory MGB with a V8 straight from Abingdon-on-Thames, but then you got the weak Rover V8. No, the best thing to do is to drop a cast-iron Detroit V8 into that B (yes, we know the Rover engine is actually of Detroit origin), like this '68 MGB-GT with a 302 and 4-speed, available for a Corvette-stomping $4000 price tag! We're assuming it's a Ford 302 and not the Chevy variety, though the seller doesn't specify that minor detail. He does, however, mention that the engine has nutso 12:1 compression, meaning no straight pump gas for this beast. There's also a crude hack-job hood scoop setup. Oh, and the engine isn't running (supposedly halfway through an electronic-ignition conversion). And the clutch and brake pedals are messed up. And the side pipes are hideous. And... well, just imagine how freakin' fast this thing would be if running!

But when it comes to exiting this life backwards in a ball of fire, nothing beats a rear-engined German machine, ja? Say, this '72 Porsche 914 mit Chevrolet 327 power, for example? With a front/rear weight distribution well into don't-want-to-think-about-it territory, this thing is sure to provide plenty of panic-stricken driving fun for the rest of your abbreviated life (though the seller claims to have used it as a daily driver for 20 years). It looks to have a manual trans, but it could be an automatic with a faux-manual shifter; in any case, the seller claims the transmission has a recent rebuild. The price tag is pretty steep, at $8900 (the seller gets extra chutzpah points for claiming it's $1000 less than that, because he's throwing in tires and wheels on the deal), but we're pretty sure a sharp wheeler-dealer such as yourself could make Baron von Small-Block see some reason. You'll need a few bucks left over to fix the godawful fender flares and do a bunch of paint and body work.

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