Human beings aren't strictly rational animals. Car enthusiasts, for all their emphasis on numbers and measurements, are roughly equal parts rational and rationalizing, and there's no end to the myths that have grown around car culture. We believe that many of those myths, while perhaps not strictly true, are beneficial and help make car culture a fun place to be. We therefore choose to live as if these myths are pure truth, and we fully support all those who do. Click Next to see some of our most cherished.

MYTH: Cars were just plain better in the old days.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: Cars are safer, more reliable, more efficient, and perform better today than they were in any version of "the old days."

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Because there are different versions of "better," and one definition has to include some sort of subjective measure of soul. As many have said, the rear end on that '59 Bel Air has enough soul for a Motown collection. And we believe that almost any older car, from AMCs to old Volvos, can have more soul, charisma, personality, or what have you have you than something modern designed to do nothing more than hold four sets of golf clubs and then crash. Plus, owning an older car almost invariably means you're working on it, and working on your own car makes your car more yours as well as making you a smarter and more capable person.

MYTH: Ferraris are the ultimate automobiles.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: The overwhelming Ferrari mystique obscures the fact that these things are overpriced, overstyled, breakdown-prone pose-mobiles.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: So who gives a damn? Frankly, the question of Ferrari ownership is probably never going to be one of our problems, and it's good to have someone at the epicenter of automotive lust. Even if you're not a Ferrari person, you probably have some equivalent ultra-car marque as the angel on top of your imaginary lottery-winning Christmas tree, and the same logic applies-someone has to be the ultimate, and the ideal of the ultimate will always be more important than the reality. At least this ideal comes with its own F1 team.

MYTH: The Indy 500 is one of the greatest races in the world.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: It's been trading on its storied history as it slowly becomes a boring and expensive spec race.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Because we believe there's still a chance that it could return to its innovative, anything-goes, world's-best-drivers glory days. Exactly how this may happen is unclear to us, and it won't happen by next year if ever, but we hold out hope. And it's still much more fun and interesting to watch than the other Greatest Race traditionally held on the same day, the glitzier but far more past-its-prime Grand Prix of Monaco.

MYTH: Car dealers can't be trusted.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: With contemporary consumer protection and access to information, you can probably trust them now more than ever before.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Because consumer skepticism, at least educated consumer skepticism, is a good thing, especially on major purchases. Trust must be earned, right? Now, this doesn't mean prospective car buyers should walk into dealerships and say "Prove to me you're not a crook!" because for one thing, you can't prove a negative. What it means is to do your research, don't let car lust carry you away, and always, always, always take a Jalopnik reader with you when buying a car.

MYTH: The Prius sucks.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: The Prius is a perfectly competent automobile that delivers very good fuel economy and has thousands of satisfied owners.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: In its quest to save precious energy resources it's created a shortage of material resources. It's hideous. For the first successful hybrid, it's remarkably uninteresting from a tech point of view-when our sister site Gizmodo featured one at their gallery and ran its 12-volt battery down showing off its flashy dashboard, we were a bit miffed to find that it couldn't jump-start itself. And seriously, we'd rather be taken out and shot out behind the storage shed than spend $28,000 on a perfectly competent automobile that delivers very good fuel economy.

MYTH: LeMans is a great movie.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: LeMans is a collection of racing footage inside of a really terrible movie.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Because that's a really, really stupendous collection of racing footage in that terrible movie. Also, the terrible movie includes Steve McQueen, which softens the blow somewhat. It really seems like making LeMans was an excuse for the director, cast, and crew to hang around the Circuit De La Sarthe with race cars for a few days, and that's something we can all understand.

MYTH: Manual transmissions are better than automatic transmissions.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: Automatics are catching up; the dual-clutch units can outperform manual boxes in many cases, and even their fuel-economy advantage may be disappearing.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Again, there's better and there's better. In this case, being in total control of your car is fun and interesting, and more fun and interest are better. To many, learning stick is still an achievement-although maybe it shouldn't be, heck, it isn't all THAT hard, but no matter-and being more capable is better than having everything done for you. We could really give a damn if the Porsche PDK systems are a tenth faster to sixty or whatever the numbers are; we didn't bother to look them up because we don't care. We would rather drive to
sixty a bit slower than ride there.

MYTH: Gaze upon my works, ye not worthy, and despair; for I am Bob motherfucking Lutz.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH IT: What, Bob Lutz? So-called Father of the Viper? He's just a marketing guy.

WHY WE BELIEVE IT ANYWAY: Listen, we need colorful figures in this world, and Bob Lutz is the most colorful person we have in the American car business. Perhaps in any business. His is a tradition going back as far as Barnum, or at least Don King. Are auto writers worried that Fritz Henderson will land a helicopter in their backyard, walk into their house, and yell at them? Is Alan Mulally or Scott Monty going to challenge us to a duel anytime soon? Nope. And seriously, without Lutz, we wouldn't have so much of modern car culture, from the phrase "The Ultimate Driving Machine" to the aforementioned Viper. Yes, there's way too much marketing in the world today, but that's not the problem. The problem is that Lutz isn't doing all of it.

The school is in Chino Hills, California, self-described as a “private, nonprofit, nonsectarian school and treatment community for troubled youngsters.” McQueen arrived here a troubled prepubescent street kid, remanded to the institute by his violent stepfather. He credited the place with giving him a sense of focus and left at age 16 as a role model for the other boys.

McQueen would go on to direct some of his wealth and attention to Boys Republic, which now hosts a small car show every year in his honor.

Wonderful Los Angeles-based blog A Time To Get was there for this year’s event. It was Porsche-heavy and the pictures are beautiful in a very analog way.

Photo Credit: A Time To Get

To appreciate the full spectrum of the XKSS’s lunacy, consider these seven easy steps you’d have to take to create a contemporary equivalent:

1. Acquire last year’s Le Mans winner: the Audi R10
2. Fit passenger door and seat
3. Fit rudimentary canvas top
4. Install windshield
5. Remove giant rear wing
6. Replace headlight assembly
7. Add a bit of chrome

And you’re done! Notice how it’s remained a race car with a featherweight carbon fiber body and a 700 HP V12 turbodiesel.

But the engine in the XKSS was not a turbodiesel. It was a gasoline-fueled straight six with triple Webers, good for 250 HP, brain-meltingly loud at 6,000 RPM and also very pretty. In a very British way.

It was not only the engine which made the D-Type such a monster at Le Mans. The body was an aluminum monocoque, carried over from aircraft manufacturing. Very advanced for its day of body-on-frame and superleggera designs, with an aerodynamically shaped underbody for low drag. And, of course, that giant asymmetrical fin behind the driver’s seat, good for stabilizing the car when you were screaming down the Mulsanne Straight at 180 MPH.

The D-Type won at Le Mans three times in a row. Fifty years after its last victory in 1957, I was wandering about the parking lot at Le Mans, waiting for the 2007 race to begin, when I spotted one. It had apparently been driven to the race on the public road. Armed with a brochure which depicted Mike Hawthorn—the man who drove the D-Type to its first victory here—I reunited car and driver.

Human biology would have allowed for such a reunion without my help, as Hawthorn would only have been a springly 78 on this cold, damp June day. But he had already been dead since 1959, having crashed his souped-up Mk1 Jaguar into a tree. Four years after eighty people died at the very Le Mans race he won. Two years after nine of the planned 25 XKSS’s were destroyed in a factory fire, resulting in the 16 examples ever made of the car.

Perhaps this is why D-Types are so downright frightening in person. They carry their grim history like a personal thundercloud tied to that massive shark fin of theirs.

Photo Credit: John Dominis/Life (McQueen in XKSS, click to download in 3200×2372!), Balázs Fenyő (Jaguar XK engine) and the author (D-Type at Le Mans in 2007)

But a Ferrari in chestnut brown?

As far as I recall, these were my first words when I heard the news that Steve McQueen’s first Ferrari, chassis number 4891GT, was set to go on the auction block. While far from being a rosso corsa purist and nurturer of a great soft spot for midnight blue 612 Scagliettis, brown sounded all wrong for a Ferrari. Think brown and what’s the first thing that comes to mind? A UPS truck, no great friend of high-strung V12’s.

Little did I know that two years later, I would be looking at McQueen’s Lusso beneath the namesake for its paintjob—a chestnut tree—and realize that in person, it’s shockingly beautiful.

Not that it hails from a particularly hideous age of car design. Modena in the early Sixties was a proper Golden Age. The Lusso was the last act in Ferrari’s first great play, the 250, a ten-year-old construction by the time they introduced the Lusso in 1962. Since the first prototype had been tested in 1952, 250’s won everything there was to be won in road racing, to transcend mere cars and become the sort of objects car geeks approach with a visible trembling of the knee.

Most 250’s are beautiful but the Lusso—Italian for luxurious luxury—stands out even in that crowd. As the name suggests, it was designed by Pininfarina as a grand tourer, with an eye on stylish, high-speed motoring as opposed to racing. There is ample luggage space behind the two seats swathed in beige leather, and the engine is set forward to allow for more legroom.

Beneath the aluminum and steel skin however, it’s a pure racer. The Lusso’s Borrani racing wheels, disc brakes, suspension and all-aluminum engine come from none other car than the 250 GTO. And the Lusso itself was more than suitable for racing: at 2,200 pounds, it weighed little more than a Miata and was in turn powered by the last version of the 3-liter V12 used in all 250’s, sucking air through three twin Webers to produce around 250 HP.

But forget all that. Though lovely numbers the Lusso has, they are not what make it interesting. What does is that the Lusso and its contemporaries—like the 250 GTO, the Breadvan or the Miura—stand out as the first generation of supercars to which we can relate to as proper cars. Pre-war Bugattis and Alfas are awesome, but they look way too fragile and old to be appreciated as actual cars as opposed to very nice objects on wheels.

Look at a Lusso instead and what you will feel is pure petrolhead lust. To fire up that V12, to motor out of wherever it’s parked, and to shove the go pedal right through the floor.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Steve McQueen drove it like that. Back in the 60s, when roads were sparsely populated, gas was ultra-cheap, and people knew how to party in style.

It almost makes you forget that these cars had live rear axles. Like Mustangs!

Photo Credit: Natalie Polgar and the author. Note: unfortunately, the owner of the Lusso was not around to pop the hood for us. The engine you see in the gallery is that of a Ferrari 250 GT SWB, very similar to the Lusso’s.

Eight hundred miles in the dark, four hundred milligrams of caffeine consumed from cans and ceramic cups and there it is: Lake Como. The road approaches from the top of the steep hills which flank its five cubic miles of frigid slate-gray water. We descend toward the city of Como then on to Cernobbio, home of the Villa d’Este, a magnificent lakeside hotel built half a millennium ago and for a day every late April, home to a handful of the world’s most beautiful cars ever built.

I can feel the small white rocks through the thin Kevlar soles of my sneakers. If you focus your eyes to ground level, a honeycomb pattern emerges, cast by the grille of a red coupé. On this very spot two years ago stood another red coupé, designed by the same man, who is now showing me secret archways of aerodynamics. The car is, of course, Jason Castriota’s Stile Bertone Mantide and this is the Concorso d’Eleganza, a show to fry every brain even vaguely interested in cars.

Classic cars, you say? Then what is Castriota’s new concept, unveiled a week ago, doing here? The Concorso was first held in 1929, on the eve of the Great Depression, as a beauty contest—for the most beautiful new cars. It certainly is the perfect geological backdrop for automotive beauty, a stone’s throw from the villa where Anakin Skywalker wed Padmé Amidala, and this will be the very last Darth Vader reference in this blogpost. The Concorso soldiered on through the Depression until World War Two, then was briefly relaunched only to die a quick death and remain in a coma until BMW resurrected it ten years ago. It is now the premium event on the European concourse circuit.

There is a tendency among petrolheads to arrive at the cars of the 50s and the 60s as the most perfect embodiment of the automotive form. It certainly is easy to see why. Prior to World War Two, the car was a luxury good, clearly evidenced by the prewar cars which make up three classes of the Concorso. These are mostly huge, baroque battleships and visually, they have more to do with horse-driven carriages than with the vehicles we think of as cars. It is very pleasing to look at, say, a 1936 Auburn, but it would be more at home on the waters of Lake Como as a hydrofoil boat than on the public road.

Something happened during the production lull which was World War Two. The cars that emerged in the 50s were smaller, more human in scale, and much closer mechanically to modern cars. To look at a Ferrari 250 GT is to look at a fairly modern sports coupé.

There is a particular 250 GT on display, a Lusso, the last model in Ferrari’s labyrinthine first production model, and this car is chestnut brown and was owned by Steve McQueen. It is deeply beautiful and next to it stand a 250 GT SWB, a Lamborghini Miura, Paul Frère’s old Maserati, and so on. Most of these cars were closely related to motor racing, a pioneering and highly dangerous— therefore very cool—activity back then. They also happen to be really pretty.

But their prettyness stems not from the fact that they are old, au contraire, they are pretty because they were radically new for their day. The Miura was one of the first road cars to have its engine midships. The Ferrari 250 GT SWB was perhaps the best road racing car of its day. The Jaguar D-Type had disc brakes.

These were cars made by people who believed in progress.

This is why it’s wrong to treat them as anything other than fine museum pieces and why it’s so refreshing to see new concepts make up a separate class at the Concorso. Concepts which may be very abstract exercises in design, never making it into production, but concepts which may introduce new ideas. Like the many trick wings on the Bertone Mantide.

What is the point of it all? It’s hard to tell. There are people here who collect cars the way they collect wristwatches and vacation homes and then there are car geeks with mischievous twinkles in their eyes, people like you and I who happen to be wealthy enough to own an interesting old car and it is their cars which bear evidence to daily driving.

But make no mistake: this is a beauty contest. A day of fine escapism, and while there are new cars on display, the answer to the future of the automobile will not emerge from here. However space age the looks, the Corvette ZR1-based Mantide will not be an answer to a world running out of space and oil and filling with people who have never owned a car but would certainly like to do so.

Perhaps the best way to approach it is as a game. Dress up in a fine spring suit, grab a glass of champagne, and enjoy the Alpine sun as you walk around the mammoth sycamore by the hotel and lean in close to the leather straps which hold engine covers above triple Webers. Tomorrow will be another day. But if you lean in close enough, you can just about hear a racing V12 scream down the Mulsanne straight at Le Mans.

Just make sure you step back when the car’s owner guns the engine for real. These things are LOUD.

Next up, we’ll look at the more interesting cars of the Concorso in detail. Like this 1938 Alfa Romeo 8C 2900B pictured above, which won this year’s Coppa d’Oro: the grand prize of the event.

Photo Credit: Natalie Polgar and the author

This teaser video is a preview of a larger promotional video, soon to follow which apparently pits everybody's favorite racing movie star against the young phenom. There's also some form of contest involved where you guess the ending for fabulous prize, which are probably watch-based, in exchange for your personal information. Don't know that we need another Formula 1 Chronograph, but we'll happily watch The Duel. (Thanks for the tip Kyle) [Tag Heuer]

Wiggle your big toe. Wiggle it with enough determination and your feet, clad in racing boots, will pop into place. All snug? All buckled up? Palms not too sweaty on the balsa wood shifter knob? Good. Your toes will now serve as figureheads on a great German ship of aluminum and titanium. Now say hello to the twelve air-cooled cylinders set to turn your cabin into a furnace and blast you down the Mulsanne Straight at 246 MPH.

When the Porsche 917 debuted at the Geneva Motor Show on this day forty years ago, nobody knew it would come to define the very spirit of Porsche. The 917 gave the company its first of 15 victories at Le Mans. In four years, it morphed into the most powerful racing car ever made. Steve McQueen turned it into a movie star in his 1971 film Le Mans. But on that March day, all Porsche had was an unsorted prototype with abysmal aerodynamics. It would have died a quick death if not for the willpower of Ferdinand Piëch, who would go through similar misery to produce a car with similar perfomance thirty years later in the Bugatti Veyron.

The difference between the two is that anybody can drive the Veyron—as proven by Top Gear’s James May—but when the 917 debuted, racing drivers would’t touch it with a stick. And just consider the titanic amounts of chutzpah one needed to get into any death trap of a 60s racing car, which killed drivers with greater precision than earlier examples of German engineering killed GI’s.

The 917 wouldn’t stay on the road. Its lightweight aluminum spaceframe was barely enough to contain the immense power of the engine, an air-cooled flat twelve which began life with 580 naturally aspirated HP. Before that could happen, an engineer by the name of John Horsmann had to figure out a new tail configuration to make the car handle. These days, we have computers and wind tunnels to help, but back then, aerodynamics was Formula 1 guys sticking random wings on tall struts and Jim Hall hacking away at his Chaparrals in Texas. Horsmann’s version increased downforce at the expense of drag and the 917 Kurzheck—German for “short tail”— was born. This was the car that won the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans, the stage for McQueen’s car nerd epic.

The 917 repeated its performance the next year before it was outlawed for 1972. Derek Bell, who would claim five victories with the 917’s successors, remembers in an article he wrote for the October 2008 issue of Octane:

Testing for the 1971 Le Mans, [Porsche chief race engineer Norbert] Singer asked me what revs I was pulling in the 917 down the Mulsanne Straight. I told him 8100rpm, which he said was a good thing because the engine would blow up at 8200rpm! That equated to 246 mph and we have never been quicker since.

The car would then cross the Atlantic to race in CanAm. With the addition of turbocharging it morphed into Moon rocket lunacy and became the Turbopanzer, also known as the 917/30, which made 1100 HP in race trim and won every race but one in the 1973 CanAm season. It retired at Talladega Superspeedway in 1975 with driver Mark Donohue—who had a week to live—taking it around the tri-oval in a 225 MPH blitz.

Yet ask people about the 917 on any side of the Atlantic and nobody remembers it anymore. Racing regulations and drivers have come and gone and Porsche has been away from Le Mans for a decade now. So why it the 917 still worth remembering? It was the last in a line of sports racers which were out to kill you, which pushed the performance envelope at the expense of safety and sanity, and when you swap your eyes with those of its driver, it still gives you a queasy, insane ride around Le Mans:

And remember: your toes, vulnerable little antennae, are in front of the front axle all the time. They get stuck in the aluminum bodywork as you wiggle for the brake pedal at the end of the Mulsanne at Mach 0.32.

Happy birthday, now, you big bad savage thing.

Photo Credit: Frank van de Velde, Porsche, edvvc

This weekend was a cold one here in the Midwest so instead of going out and braving the weather we decided to hibernate instead, but not before heading out to our local cult video store and grabbing a couple of our all-time favorite classic movies. We got a couple of goodies including: Le Mans, The Great Escape and couple of our significant other's favorite Agatha Christie mystery TV episodes featuring the quirky detective, Hercule Poirot.

After watching a couple of these films we got to thinking about what some of these famous actors would be like if they were celebrities in today's day and age. We contemplated this for a while (mostly while suffering through Agatha Christie's, The Mysterious Affair at Styles) and got to thinking about what some of these celebrities would drive. So, thanks in part to both our boredom and ADHD, we've come up with the list below featuring some of our favorite classic celebrities and what we think they would drive if they were alive today.

Bettie Page	James Dean	Bob Ross
Louis Armstrong	Steve McQueen	Tiny Tim
Lucille Ball	Frank Sinatra	Elvis Presley
Audrey Hepburn	Charlie Chaplin	Marlon Brando
Marilyn Monroe	John Wayne	Bruce Lee
George Burns	Harry Houdini	Vincent Price
Cesar Romero	Agatha Christie	Ray Charles

[inspired by our ADHD and famousdeaddb, clips via YouTube]

Born: 1930-03-24 – Died: 1980-11-07

Steve McQueen was an American actor who gained the nickname "The King of Cool" based on his "anti-hero" persona. His most famous movies were Le Mans, The Great Escape and Bullitt, in the later, he did all his own driving stunts behind the wheel of the now famous, "Highland Green" 1968 Ford Mustang 390 CID Fastback.

Is it cliche to be a big fan of Steve McQueen? We're in a position where we can ask which of McQueen's star cars are the coolest. He's owned some fine automobiles and... uhh... married Ali MacGraw. We put it to you, readers, who is your automotive hero?

Start talking about Steve McQueen's cars, and the first one that'll come to mind for most people is the Dark Highland Green 1968 Ford Mustang from Bullitt. Thing is, McQueen never actually owned the car. Of course, that doesn't disqualify the 'stang for this contest, but it does raise an interesting question. Did McQueen even particularly like the Mustang? His personal garage was filled mostly with European sports cars, not American muscle. Watching the chase scene, you'll notice that neither the Charger nor the Mustang take turns all that well. It's even been said that the shot of the 'stang overcooking one of the corners wasn't planned at all. Though I suppose if I'm going to start critiquing the film too closely, I would also have to start counting green VW Beetles, and I really don't want to do that. Besides, this isn't some class for a film student; we're here for the car. And it must be said the dark Mustang fastback with a 390ci V8 looks and sounds fantastic. It's an automotive icon. But there's a problem with that. Being famous to a degree is cool, but being a tool for a marketing department is not. In recent years, Ford has made not just one "special edition" Bullitt Mustang, but two. Which means that you really don't have to be "in the know" to know about the car. It's like having your favorite rock band from the '60s all of a sudden become hugely popular again. You like the music still, but the all the teenage fans, the Broadway musicals, and the appearances on daytime television just sort of ruin the cool factor.


Unlike the Mustang, McQueen actually owned the '70 Porsche 911 S from Le Mans. He wanted a car to drive around in Europe while he was shooting the film, so he bought the Porsche, and when shooting was finished, he had it sent back to America. Now sure, there's no on-screen hoonage starring the 911, but you can only imagine that McQueen drove the snot out of the thing when he was off-camera. But that's not the point—this car was was cool not because it drove around jumping over hills and chasing baddies. The 911 is cool because it is understated and relaxed; it's what the tormented race car driver drove when, as McQueen's character famously put it in the film, he was "just waiting" between races. It has what the Mustang lacks: inconspicuousness. You really need to be obsessed with cars to appreciate the Porsche. For example, the current owner of the 911 was a Porsche collector who bought the car a few years ago without even knowing that it was in the Le Mans film; he just liked the car. Watch it cruise through France and you can't help but like it too.

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You can own this classic for $12.99 at Amazon, but if you live near a Borders we've confirmed rumors that it can be had in the bargain bin for just $9.99. At that price, you might as well get two so you can play it in stereo.

This is easily the most epic creative task I've undertaken; my wife and I traveled cross-country twice to shoot bikes and interview owners, and the process was thrilling, daunting, and ultimately incredibly rewarding. Jay Leno was cool enough to write the foreword.

The ex-Steve McQueen 1963 FERRARI 250 GT/L LUSSO BERLINETTA DESIGN BY PININFARINA; COACHWORK BY SCAGLIETTI Chassis No. 4891 Engine No. 4891

Marrone Metallizzato, Beige leather interior
Engine: V-12, 2,953cc, three Weber dual throat carburetors, 250bhp at 7,000 rpm; Gearbox: 4-speed manual; Suspension: front, independent with coil springs and tubular shock absorbers; rear, live axle with semi-elliptical leaf springs and tubular shock absorbers; Brakes: four-wheel discs. Left hand drive.

Perfection is approached progressively, in stages and steps.
For Steve McQueen the pursuit of perfection began in 1955 when he, along with some 200 others, auditioned for one of two openings in Lee Strasberg's Actors' Studio. He and Martin Landau where selected for those exclusive positions. The following years saw McQueen appear in several New York-based television productions before continuing his television career in Hollywood with roles like Josh Randall in "Trackdown". Creating characters, an acting style and a persona which would become legendary, Steve McQueen was on his way.
McQueen landed his first starring movie role in 1958 in the science fiction milestone "The Blob" while building his television reputation with the series "Wanted: Dead or Alive" which developed the John Randall character into a five-year series, from 1958 through 1961, totaling 73 episodes. With this role Steve McQueen became an instantly recognized acting celebrity, but the best was yet to come.
From the late 50's on McQueen managed parallel careers in television with "Wanted: Dead or Alive" and in film with movies and roles of steadily increasing significance. He achieved breakout success in "The Magnificent Seven" in 1960, an environment of unusual complexity, featuring a strong group of charismatic actors. Steve McQueen's presence on camera, although overmatched on paper by the accomplishments, reputations, billing and experience of established stars like Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn and James Coburn, always drew the eyes and attention of theatergoers.
The McQueen legend was anchored in bedrock in 1963 with his role as Captain Hilts in "The Great Escape." Once again surrounded by a stellar cast including James Garner, (Sir) Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasance, James Coburn and David McCallum, Steve McQueen's portrayal of Hilts, the baseball-playing loner American escape artist, combined dedication, bravery, determination and bravado with a motorcycle chase that set the stage for later McQueen driving/riding roles in "Bullitt" and "Le Mans".
McQueen was the king of cool, with a self-deprecating casualness that only enhanced his charm, capability and charisma. His fondness for automobiles, motorcycles, toys and generally anything mechanical permeated his life, both on-screen and off.
His career was on a roll in early 1963 when Steve McQueen and his wife Neile Adams walked into Otto Zipper's Wilshire Boulevard showroom in Santa Monica and left behind a check that made Steve's years at California's Boys Republic seem a distant memory. It was the deposit on a new Ferrari 250 GT/L Lusso Berlinetta, the car offered here.
The Ferrari 250 GT
Enzo Ferrari had begun his company's own quest for the perfect gran turismo in 1954, in a fitting parallel with Steve McQueen's 1955 acceptance into The Actors' Studio. Ferrari's vehicle was the 250 GT Europa. Powered by a development of the original Ferrari V-12 engine designed by Gioacchino Colombo, the first 3-liter 250 GT Europa with three Weber carburetors gave some 250bhp. Its chassis was Ferrari's first road car with coil spring independent front suspension.
For Ferrari the creation of the 250 GT Europa spelled commercial success. Although only thirty-six examples were built, it led directly to Ferrari's next series-produced gran turismo, the 250 GT bodied by Boano and its successor Ellena to a design by Pinin Farina. Built from 1956 through 1958, production of the 250 GT Boano/Ellena berlinettas amounted to some 130 cars. They established a pattern for future 250 GTs: voluptuous yet practical coachwork from the pen of Pinin Farina with Ferrari's race-developed and proven V-12 engine and refined parallel tube chassis with independent front and live axle rear suspension.
As Steve McQueen managed parallel television and movie careers in Hollywood in the late Fifties, Ferrari launched the parallel development paths for the 250 GT with the 250 GT Berlinetta Tour de France, the 250 GT Short Wheelbase Berlinetta, California Spyder and the 250 GT Pinin Farina Coupé and Cabriolet.
The reputation of the Ferrari 250 was also to take a leap in the next few years with the introduction and development of the 250 Testa Rossa sports-racers, automobiles that would become ubiquitous in the hands of the factory and numerous private entrants and would dominate the podium results of every major international and national race and series for the next five years and elevate the designation "250" into the top ranks of automobile history.
Ferrari piled success upon success for the 250 GT, particularly with the 250 GT SWB and its successor the brilliant 250 GTO. Over 1,500 250 GT Pininfarina Coupes, Cabriolets and GTEs satisfied the market's demand for handsome, comfortable and satisfying to drive pure road-going gran turismos. Ferrari and Pininfarina, however, recognized that something more - more distinctive, more exclusive, more desirable - was needed to crown the 250 GT's history. Thus, late in 1962 at the Paris Show, Ferrari brought out the last of the 250 GT series, the 250 GT/L Lusso berlinetta.
The Lusso combined the best features of the 250 GT Short Wheelbase Berlinetta and the 250 GTO in one beautiful, refined, quick, responsive, luxurious package, wrapped in one of Pininfarina's most successful designs. Built on the short 2,400mm wheelbase chassis modified to place the 250hp 3-liter Colombo-derived engine and engine-mounted 4-speed gearbox between the front wheels for more cockpit room, the Lusso drew from the GTO its precisely located rear axle with semi-elliptical leaf springs and Watts linkage. Production bodies were executed in steel by Scaglietti following Pininfarina's design.
And what a design it was. Instantly recognizable as a Pininfarina-designed Ferrari, the Lusso was at once slim, svelte and sexy, a masterpiece of design which was matched by its aerodynamic refinement, the direct result of Ferrari's and Pininfarina's experience with the round-tailed SWB and the cutoff Kamm tail of the GTO. Slim, light pillars supported a thin roof and left abundant glass area. The sloping back window flowed gracefully to the short rear deck and small but effective spoiler above the Kamm-back cutoff tail.
"Lusso" means luxury and this elegantly designed Pininfarina creation was appropriately trimmed and appointed with thick carpets and soft leather. Its unusual instrument grouped the tachometer and speedometer in large pods at the dashboard's center and placed the engine instruments in a panel directly in front of the driver, giving the Lusso's interior its own hint of advanced design.
Like all Ferraris the Lusso was a driver's car, with excellent visibility and a seriously driver-centric grouping of instruments and controls that said, no matter how "lusso" the interior and seductively sculpted the Pininfarina/Scaglietti body, that the 250 GT/L Lusso was intended to cover large amounts of ground quickly. In production for barely eighteen months, 350 would be built and they are today one of the most appreciated and sought of all Ferrari's front-engined V-12 powered gran turismos.
This Car
The history of this car, particularly during its initial ownership by Steve McQueen, is particularly well documented in the memories and photographs of William Claxton, McQueen's close friend and a professional photographer who was at one time the Art Director of Motor Trend magazine. Its current owner, Michael Regalia, has connected with many people who knew Steve McQueen when he owned the Lusso or worked on it for him. It therefore has a particularly rich and variegated history to enhance its appeal to serious collectors.
McQueen took delivery in mid-1963 and he, Claxton and their wives immediately set out on a long road trip familiar to many attendees at the Monterey Historics and Pebble Beach Concours weekend. Starting from Los Angeles, the McQueens in their new Lusso and William and Peggy Claxton in their Porsche 356 SC took off up the California coast through Big Sur and Carmel to Monterey. From there they headed to San Francisco, then over the Sierras to Reno/Lake Tahoe, down through Death Valley and back to Southern California. Claxton has related in a recent Motor Trend article how McQueen would set up a rendezvous point then take off in the Lusso to arrive early "pretending to be bored waiting for us to arrive. It was a great time. He really loved that car."
McQueen and the Lusso got some track time at Riverside in 1965 when he was doing an ad shoot for TAG watches in a Lola. In between shots McQueen, no doubt loath to see an empty track with nothing on it, went out in the Lusso. Richard Freshman recalls seeing it with Steve and Neile at the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. Steve's love of the Lusso was famous. Famed Porsche restorer Joe Cavagliere, recalls working as a valet parker at the time and vividly remembers that McQueen always parked it himself, the only celebrity who wouldn't let Joe park his (or her) car.
It is featured in a number of photo shoots by William Claxton, including several with his wife Peggy, a professional model, and particularly a shoot with Steve McQueen and Peggy for Cosmopolitan. Serviced initially at Zipper's, McQueen later took it to Hollywood Sports Cars. It was repainted for McQueen by Lee Brown - who in recent years remembered the car and even retrieved a small can of carefully preserved (but now dry as a bone) touchup paint marked "McQueen Lusso." McQueen owned it for many years but eventually parted with the Lusso, perhaps in late 1967 when he acquired his Ferrari NART Spyder after experiencing one during the filming of "The Thomas Crown Affair." In 1973 it was with Charlie Hayes at Salon Ferrari in Santa Ana and it was there that Tom Sherwood purchased it in July 1973. Sherwood drove it to San Francisco where it was, to all intents and purposes, stored and unused for the next 24 years until it was spotted by Michael Regalia, past president of the Nethercutt Collection and the guiding light behind many of J.B. Nethercutt's concours-winning restorations, in 1995. Regalia calls it, at the time "the nicest, unmolested Lusso that needed a restoration in the world. Cosmetically it was not great, but it ran very well." It took him two years, until November 1997, to convince Sherwood to let it go.
The Lusso's Steve McQueen history was undocumented at the time but shortly thereafter Mike Sheehan obtained and sent to Michael Regalia a copy of Luigi Chinetti's order from Otto Zipper showing the original color, Marrone, and the ultimate purchaser as Steve McQueen. Subsequent research throughout Southern California, aided by Steve McQueen's and Neile Adams' son Chad McQueen, introduced the owner to William Claxton, painter Lee Brown, and others who remembered the Lusso from Steve McQueen's ownership.
Restoration was begun in late 2000. Mike Regalia disassembled the Lusso himself and stripped the body to bare metal which revealed completely rust-free and undamaged sheet metal and chassis. The engine and drivetrain were disassembled, found to be in excellent condition internally, then carefully rebuilt and reassembled by Mike Regalia. Doing all the metal work, disassembly, reassembly, chrome trim metalwork, suspension, mechanical work and detailing himself, he took his time and proceeding slowly until late 2004 when a call from Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance co-chairman Glen Mounger inviting the McQueen Lusso to the 2005 Concours accelerated the project. Tom Ryan and Prestige assisted with the paint and upholstery during the push to complete but with those exceptions - and of course specialized subcontracting like plating and machining - the entire restoration was done personally by Michael Regalia.
Completed in time for the concours, additional work followed which resulted in earning Platinum Awards at the January 2006 Cavallino Classic and 2006 Concours on Rodeo and Best in Class at Amelia Island in March. It has subsequently been displayed at the Petersen Museum in Los Angeles and was invited by Ferrari to be displayed at the recent 60th Anniversary Concours in Maranello.
In addition to the classic feature article in Motor Trend, the McQueen 250 GT/L Lusso is the subject of a feature article in the August 2007 issue of Robb Report and will be the subject of an in-production segment on television where it is driven by Chad McQueen.
Its show awards, including standing up to the intense scrutiny of the expert judges at Cavallino Classic, demonstrate the high quality of its restoration and preparation by Michael Regalia. Presented in all respects in as-new condition, it comes with extensive documentation including a copy of the original order from Otto Zipper to Luigi Chinetti for Steve McQueen, Lee Brown's pint of touchup paint, various documentation and copies of photographs from William Claxton and even Steve McQueen's original California license plates. The rear plate is restored while the front plate - which the owner does not use because it detracts from the beauty of the Lusso's Pininfarina/Scaglietti lines - is still original and unrestored.
Even when called "Marrone Metallizzato", Brown does not convey the particular appeal, attraction and distinctiveness of Steve McQueen's choice of color for his 250 GT/L Lusso. The rare chosen color beautifully complements the coachwork. It is instantly apparent that this is a very special Lusso, and instantly recognizable as the distinctive, appreciated, beloved possession of Steve McQueen, the king of cool.
It is an example of the highest, best and most refined development of Ferrari's 250 GT series, the closest to perfection which the combined talents of Ferrari, Pininfarina and Scaglietti could bring this singularly important series of automobiles from Maranello. It will be an enthusiastically welcomed participant at any of the many exclusive events for which it is eligible. Now carefully restored, thoroughly and unquestionably documented and thoughtfully presented in impeccable cosmetic and mechanical condition which would have made the ex-mechanic in Steve McQueen proud, the McQueen Lusso's history is just beginning to unfold.

Here's a high-octane treat we're hoping sweetens your weekend. We just dropped $1,200 playing 6-way pot-limit Omaha high and are pretty far down in the dumps (not that far, we're still up over $700, but man that hand was a bad beat... stupid river Ace cracking my Queen set). Anyhow, this clip has sure cheered us up. As the man who sent it to us, Mr. Gribbon, explains, "Check this out and tell me watching it is not like shotgunning a can of Red Bull." He's not far off. Sound all the way up, friends. – Jonny Lieberman

Anything That Happens Before Or After Is Just Waiting: 24 Hours of Le Mans, 2007; Both Of Our Minds Psyched-In Together: The Making Of Bullitt [Internal]

Yes, we're well aware that it's an insipid almost vapid question. However, it is a national holiday and some of us have been up for days. That said, we were out the other evening with a friend who could not get over how blue our car is. We tried explaining how cool World Rally Blue actually is on a Subaru, but she just called us a dork. And seeing how she is a member of the Weird Al fan club, her jab stung. Still, color does make the car. Sometimes. Black BMW 3-Series look as much like used lumps of soap as silver ones. But would you have a Ferrari in any other color than red? Sure, if you are Steve McQueen you can pull off brown. But a yellow prancing horse instantly paints you as having more money than taste. And even people with more money than taste don't want that. Conversely, and oddly, nothing says, "My car can beat up your car" quite like a bright yellow Z06. And if Jeep actually releases the JT in "hearing aid beige" we're buying one. What say you? – Jonny Lieberman

[The Jalopnik Question of the Day gets asked each and every day except for those that it doesn't. Do you have a question you want answered? Email it to tips@jalopnik.com with the subject line "QOTD"]

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We were 99.99% sure Steve McQueen was the coolest man who ever lived before we watched this clip about his "commitment to reality." After viewing it, we are happy to report the 0.01% of doubt has been snubbed out. Basically, "...so that when we went by them at well over 100 mph, they knew what we were going to do and we knew what they were going to do." I mean, he even calls it "the ton mark." Damn man, just damn. Full clip of the greatest chase ever filmed after the jump. – Jonny LIeberman

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Supercar Weekend: Steve McQueen's Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta Lusso Goes on the Block [Internal]