We’ve already shared some information on the MidAmerica/Mecum motorcycle auction taking place January 9-11 at south end of The Strip in Las Vegas, but that sale has a competitor on its opening day, Bonhams’ annual classic motorcycle sale at Bally’s Hotel & Casino.

Bonhams’ sale will include an Isle of Man winner and a BMW factory racer credited with changing American minds about Bimmer bikes.

The 1947 Vincent HRD Series B Rapide that won the 1950 Isle of Man Clubman TT beneath Alex Phillip will be up for bidding. Estimated to be worth as much as $150,000, after its big victory, the bike was uprated to full Black Lightning specifications — Phillip called it a “rocketship” — an was sold to British commando and war hero Lt. Colonel “Mad Jack” Churchill.

The 1972 Butler & Smith BMW F750 is one of two purpose-built, factory-supplied racing bikes sent to tuner Udo Geitl of Butler & Smith, the BMW motorcycle importers for the United States. Geitl’s tweaks produced stunningly faster bikes that raced in the 1973 Daytona 200 and helped to change the image of BMW motorcycles in the U.S. from “stuffy tourer” to sporting machine.

The F750s also were predecessors to the Butler & Smith BMW R90S model that Geitl readied and that Reg Pridmore rode to the first world Superbike championship.

The F750 up for bidding was ridden at Daytona by Kurt Leibmann while Pridmore rode its twin. Pre-auction estimated value is as much as $75,000.

“We are very pleased to have been selected to represent these historic motorcycles at auction,” said Nick Smith, motorcycle manager for Bonhams U.S. Motoring Division. “Both machines are quite significant for different reasons and both represent the ultimate in motorcycling: racing at its highest level.”

Also in the catalog for the sale are the Silverman Museum Racing Collection of Ducatis and the Pierce Family Museum Collection of Harley-Davidsons.

Another in a series of previews of classic car auctions in January.

When Dana Mecum staged his first classic car auction in Florida, it was held in conjunction with the annual Florida Corvette show at Cyprus Gardens.

“We started out with 40 cars in the parking lot behind the laundry at the Hilton Hotel,” said Mecum, whose Mecum Auctions returns to Florida in January, 2014 for an auction that will offer a quite few more than 40 cars.

“The auction doubled in size every year,” Mecum said, explaining that it wasn’t long before the original venue could provide no more than 250 places to park the auction cars.

“But we had consigned 400 cars so we had to move,” Mecum said.

Mecum moved from Cyprus Gardens to Osceola Heritage Park in Kissimmee, a community known for hosting lots of visitors (Osceola Heritage Park is a 12-mile drive from Disney World).

Again, consignments doubled each year. Well, until the last couple of years, when the growth slowed, though for good reason. After all, there are only so many classic cars available for sale at any given time, and last year Mecum’s Kissimmee event offered up bidding on 2,500 of them.

“But 3,000 is our goal,” said Mecum, adding that consignments for the 2014 auction are running ahead of the pace they arrived for the 2013 event.

“That would be something to brag about,” he said of reaching his goal of 3,000 cars at a single auction.” That would be something our company can do and no other company has the infrastructure to put together and handle that many cars.”

To put the scope of Mecum’s Kissimmee event in perspective, that one auction offers about the same number of cars as all six sales taking place during the Arizona Auction Week.

“The whole industry has settled around Arizona,” Mecum said. “We sat down one day and said, ‘there’s a lot of cars east of the Mississippi, too’.”

Now, he added, Kissimmee “has become our flagship.”

But it’s not only the number of cars available at the Kissimmee auction that has doubled and then doubled again and again. Mecum recently signed a three-year contract with NBC and its Sports Group of channels to televise many of his company’s auctions, starting with Kissimmee.

“For more than 20 years, we lived with our main media partner being Hemmings, and it still is our primary print partner,” Mecum said. “But it has 250,000 subscriptions.

“We went from that to Discovery/Velocity [TV outlets]. When we started, there were  15-18 million households [with those channels available]. It has grown to be in the 35-40 million range.

“But now we’re moving to NBC Sports and moving from 35-40 million to 80-90 million. We’re doubling our exposure. It’s a very big deal.”

Mecum also is expanding his company’s exposure by adding new events. The inaugural sale at Harrisburg, Pa., will be July 24-26 and plans are being made for another new sale, this one in Seattle.

But first come the MidAmerica motorcycle sale Jan. 9-11 in Las Vegas (Mecum is buying the long-time motorcycle auction house from its founder) and the Kissimmee sale that runs from Jan. 17-26.

With nearly 3,000 cars available at Kissimmee, there figures to be something for everyone. Mecum grades cars from general to featured to stars to “main attraction.”

This year the big attractions at Kissimmee include a couple of Duesenbergs, a couple of L88 Corvettes, a Boss 429 Mustang and the auction superstar, “The “Real McCoy” Corvette.

Mecum says his Florida auction “started as a Corvette auction and our roots are very much Corvettes. Last year we had 700 Corvettes at Kissimmee.”

The Real McCoy car is a 1956 Chevrolet Corvette SR prototype that some will tell you is the car that kept the Corvette in production. Ford launched its two-seater, the Thunderbird, for 1955 and sold 16,000 of them while Chevy found buyers for only some 700 of its fiberglass-bodied roadsters.

Chevrolet engineer Zora Arkus-Duntov knew his pet project was in jeopardy, so he stuffed a special V8 engine under the hood and headed off to Daytona Beach, where, on the eve of General Motors’ big Motorama show in New York City, he set a two-way, flying-mile speed record. Duntov then worked with three-time Indy 500 winner Maury Rose and legendary mechanic Smokey Yunick to prep the car for the Sebring endurance race, in which John Fitch and Walt Hansgen drove to ninth overall and first in their production sports car class.

Chevrolet touted the car as “The Real McCoy” in an advertising campaign.

“The Real McCoy,” said Mecum. “This is the car that saved the brand.”

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The Antique Automobile Club of America Museum in Hershey, Pa., usually focuses on the preservation and restoration of veteran vehicles to original condition. Which is why the special exhibit opening this month is so unexpected.

“The Art of the Build: Rods & Kustoms”  goes on display Jan. 24 through April 27, and takes a hot rod run through the world of individualized custom cars, including a number of top award winners as well as some of the true oddities of the hobby. Usually, the AACA mourns the loss of original cars to build customs, but this time around, it celebrates the customs and the customizers.

Among the unique beauties  on display are some of the top contenders for the prestigious Ridler Award, given annually at the Detroit Autorama. The AACA show also focuses on some of the legends whose custom cars made everybody sit up and take notice, folks such as Boyd Coddington, Ed “Big Daddy” Roth and George Barris, the “King of Kustomizers.”

“The ‘Art of the Build’ exhibit focuses on these individuals, and the rolling art they have created,” an AACA Museum news release says. “By treating each custom vehicle as a piece of sculpture, the Museum has planned this display as an art installation, celebrating each item for what it has become, not lamenting what it once was.”

For more information,  visit aacamuseum.org. 

Another in a series of previews of classic car auctions in January.

Bonhams is doing everything it can to make the third time the charm in selling classic cars at auction in Arizona.

“When people get our catalog they will see a quite severe upgrade in the quality of the cars we’re offering,” promised Jakob Greisen, motorcar specialist and head of business development for Bonhams motoring department.

Greisen said Bonhams set out on the new path last summer with its classic car auction at the Quail Lodge in Monterey, Calif.

“Our Quail auction went from $12 million in 2012 to just over $30 million in 2013, and with less cars,” said Greisen, who joined Bonhams last year from Gooding & Co.

The idea, he added, is “less but more,” as in fewer offerings, but offerings of high quality.

Bonhams, established in England in 1793, certainly is known for the quality of its auction offerings in Europe, where it recently handled the sale of the famed Ecurie Ecosse racing team collection and where, last summer, it sold the 1954 Mercedes-Benz W196R Grand Prix car for a world-record auction price of $29.65 million.

Not only will the quality of the cars be upgraded, Greisen said, but so will their presentation January 16 at the Westin Kierland resort in Scottsdale.

“We sat down and said, ‘you know what? It’s a very big marketplace and our share is not where it should be, and when it comes to the  handful of auction houses that can handle an important car, we’re not handling as many as we should be. We rethought our strategy and our business plan. We’ve been outgoing more and have reached out more to our clients. Especially in Scottsdale.

“It’s about offering the client something unusual, something they have to buy at auction, that they cannot find on eBay or Hemmings, something that [they realize presents] an opportunity.”

For example? Griesen offers two of them , one a pre-war car, one from the post-war period.

The pre-war car is a 1931 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 supercharged gran sport spider with bodywork by Zagato.

“The car has a fabulous history,” Griesen said. “It was bought new by a baron in France, a young playboy who raced at Le Mans and had airplanes and he had this great car.”

The young baron co-drove an Alfa 8C with Luigi Chinetti at Le Mans in 1933 and they finished second, trailing only another 8C co-driven by the legendary Tazio Nuvolari and Frenchman Raymond Sommer. In the 1930s, the baron sent his wife and son to Switzerland but he remained in France and joined the resistance movement.

He sold the Alfa 6C in 1935. Through several owners, the car remained in France in original condition until it was sold in 2007 at Monterey. The American collector who bought it there had it restored. He sold it three years later. The consignor for the Scottsdale auction also had it restored, by Steve Babinsky of American Restorations.

Since then, still with its original engine and bodywork, it has been shown at the Pebble Beach and Amelia Island concours. In 2013, the car participated in the Mille Miglia and then took part in the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este.

The car’s pre-auction estimate is $2.4 million to $2.7 million.

Griesen’s post-war example of Bonhams boost in quality is “the tailor’s car,” a 1951 Ferrari 212 Export Berlinetta with bodywork by Touring.

“The car has had the same ownership since 1969 and is one of four export 212s that had Touring superleggera coachwork,” Griesen said

The car, he added, was one of the first Ferraris produced, purchased new by Augusto Caraceni, a racing driver and professional tailor with clients that included Enzo Ferrari, Gianni Agnelli, Aristotle Onasissis, Humphrey Bogart and Cary Grant.

The car came to the United States in the early 1960s and the consignor has owned it since 1969. Its restoration, by several Ferrari experts, began in 2008.

Since it’s restoration, Griesen said, “it has never been shown, but it is a car you could take to Pebble Beach or Cavallino Classic and the Mille Miglia.”

The pre-auction estimate is $3-$4 million.

While the Alfa and Ferrari may be two of the most outstanding examples of Bonhams’ new push, Griesen noted that the catalog ranges from a 1910 Simplex 50HP Toy Tonneau to a 2010 Ferrari 599XX. In between those dates and cars are many others, including two Mercedes-Benz 300SLs, a gulling and a roadster; a 1936 Mercedes-Benz 500K sports phaeton; a 1966 Ferrari 275 GTB/6C; a 1954 Bentley R-type Continental fastback; and a 1950 Delahaye originally displayed at the Paris auto salon.

And it’s not just the quality of the cars offered that has been upgraded, Griesen said. So has the quality of the automobila offerings, which include such unique items as the tweed jacket worn by Steve McQueen in the movie Bullitt.

Photos courtesy of Bonhams

Another in a series of previews of classic car auctions in January.

Let’s have some fun with numbers (Gooding & Co. certainly did in 2013):

• 10
• 192,600,000
• 286
• 50
• 673,68
• 95

Now for the fun…

The 10 is here because 2013 marked a decade in business for the classic car auction company started by David Gooding, who grew up in one of the country’s best collections — his father was the curator at the National Automobile Museum (nee Harrah’s) — and David took his lifelong knowledge of classic cars with him to Christie’s and RM before launching on his own.

That 192.6 million is the dollar value of the 286 classic vehicles sold in 2013 at Gooding & Co.’s three auctions. Fifty of those vehicles sold for $1 million or more.

Yes, the fact that the average sale at a Gooding & Co. auction was $673,686 is quite impressive. But even more impressive to my way of thinking is the fact that 95 percent of all vehicles offered at those sales actually were sold.

“We love that number,” said Garth Hammers, one of the car specialists at Gooding. “We put a lot of work into that. We accept cars very carefully. It has to be the right car, the finest example we can find. It has to be priced competitively, and it has to be something people are looking for.”

Consider that the vast majority of vehicles sold at Gooding & Co. auctions carry significant reserve prices. Auction houses work with consignors to set those reserves. Set them too low and consignors go home discouraged they didn’t get what their cars were really worth. Set them too high and both bidders and consignors are discouraged, bidders because they couldn’t buy the car and consignors because the car didn’t sell.

But consign the right cars and know your customers — both sellers and buyers — and cars sell for the right price and everyone goes home happy.

Note that while other auction houses are adding events, Gooding has kept its calendar to three sales — Arizona, Amelia Island and Pebble Beach.

“The sales roster that we have allows us to focus on customer service and being able to hand choose every car that goes into each of the sales,” Hammers said.

The limited schedule allows Gooding & Co. specialists and other staffers to spend time searching for those best-example cars and to work on important but less publicized parts of the business — brokering private (non-auction) sales and helping car-collecting clients with estate planning.

Gooding opens its second decade with its annual January sale in Arizona, where it sets up shop in a couple of big tents next in the parking lot next to the Dillard’s department store at the high-end Scottsdale Fashion Square shopping mall.

The catalog for the auction includes 118 lots, and 20 of them are vehicles wearing the three-pointed star of Mercedes-Benz.

“Once we saw it coming together and that we were moving in that direction, we thought it would be interesting to pull in a lot of different models from Mercedes-Benz,” Hammers said. “Historically, they sell very well. Mercedes has had so many timely designs and their engineering is beyond reproach.”

He added that classic Mercedes, even those just being “awakened from a sometimes long slumber” are capable and reliable drivers, whether on classic tours or in everyday traffic.

One reason for that, he said, was the Mercedes-Benz Classic Center, a Mercedes-owned parts and restoration shop in Irvine, Calif., that has become something of a one-stop shop for keeping vintage Mercedes on the road and running and looking good.

Among the Mercedes being offered at Gooding’s Arizona sale are a pair of 1956 300SL gullwings that may share their red interior and black body colors, histories of nearly 50 years of single-family ownership, and even their estimated values, but otherwise are very different.

One, valued at $1.35-$1.7 million, was owned by a single family for nearly 50 years, but sold in 2006 and a year later underwent a concours-quality restoration at RM Auto Restorations. The car was sold again in 2011 and won best-in-class honors at the San Marino, Calif., concours.

The other, with an estimated value of $1.1-$1.4 million, is offered in original condition. The car was put into storage in the 1970s and only recently has been rediscovered.

“They are priced somewhat similarly but are probably for vastly different customers,” Hammers said. “One car has been off the road for decades. It has its original interior, but the leather has splits in it. The headliner is threadbare. But it’s wonderfully original.

“The other has been restored to an extremely high standard and is as comfortable on the road as it is on the show field.”

But the Arizona auction isn’t just a Mercedes-Benz showcase, Hammers said, pointing out cars such:

• the 1929 Duesenberg Model J dual-cowl phaeton originally owned by one of the Dodge brothers and the 2010 best-in-show winner at the Meadow Brook concours;
• the 1997 McLaren F1 GTR “longtail” FIA GT racer (see photo below);
• a 1956 Ferrari 410 Superamerica, one of 16 and “likely the last one that’s unrestored”;
• a 1986 Ferrari 280 GTO that not only has been “federalized,” but is “California-legal”;
• a 1958 Ferrari 250 GT Series 1 cabriolet.

And while those are expected to be seven-figure vehicles, the catalog includes several other less-expensive gems, Hammer said, including a pair of 1956 Austin-Healey 100Ms, a 1971 Alfa Romeo Montreal and for the first time ever at a Gooding auction, a 1954 Hudson Italia.

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Another in of a series of articles about cars that someday may be considered classics.

Car collectors usually start out by buying the car they wanted but couldn’t have in high school. For baby boomers, those were Detroit muscle cars and little deuce coupes. But for a younger generation, they were road-legal rally cars, vehicles such the 2004 Subaru WRX STI.

Subaru was among those seeking global attention for their cars by racing in the early years of this century in the World Rally Championship. Rallying may not have been as big in the United States as Formula One, Indy cars or NASCAR, but globally it was second only to F1 and even here is was popular with the video gamers.

Subaru’s WRC hopes rode — and rode well, winning the championship twice within three years — on a souped-up version of its Impreza compact sedan. To race in the WRC an automaker had to homologate its racer for the road and thus the WRX STI. WRX was sort of short for World Rally eXperimental and the STI came from Subaru Technica International, the company’s in-house motorsports shop.

What those letters brought were 300 turbocharged horsepower and 300 pound-feet of torque from Subaru’s 2.5-liter, horizontally opposed four-cylinder engine, an architecture similar to that employed by the likes of Ferrari and Porsche, just with fewer cylinders in Subaru’s case.

With a six-speed manual, strengthened suspension components, Brembo brakes and driver-adjustable full-time four-wheel drive, the WRX STI was (and remains) quick and nimble. With a massive hood scoop, big BBS wheels and ginormous rear wing, it had (still has) a menacing presence that belies its commuter-car underpinnings.

Put it all together and the WRX STI is ready for handbrake J-turns on dusty forest roads (the center diff is so smart it disengages the rear-wheel drive when the handbrake is applied) and for smoking its tires — and its competition — on tight autocross circuits. Don’t be surprised if it also shows up on classic car auction blocks somewhere down the road.