Ferrari lovers take note: Ferrari 288 GTO to be auctioned in Monterey

11 August, 2016

One of the best Ferrari sports cars ever produced — the Ferrari GTO — was a 2.8-litre twin-turbo V8 400hp gem, based on a steel tube-frame chassis dripping in carbon-fibre panels. Desirable yes, and now for sale. Mecum Auctions in Monterey have an 11,000km example for sale during their August 18–20 auction period, with optioned air conditioning, stereo, and power windows! Sound like the car for you? Of course it does, who wouldn’t want one — however, you’ll need up to US$3 million.

It seems pricey, but if you’ve got the money it would be a fantastic investment. Just five years ago, a similar example sold for US$650K. This example features certification from Ferrari’s in-house certifier and restorer, known as the Ferrari Classiche, to prove its authenticity.

Now, all I have to do is check in between my couch cushions for the required moolah to purchase this ’80s bad boy!

Images: Mecum Auctions

Janspeed recreates the Jaguar sports car

29 September, 2026

Thankfully, a few of these cars made it to New Zealand, the odd one being imported from the UK over the years. However, the 1988 British Racing Green example owned by Bill Slater in Upper Hutt was originally sold as a standard car but converted using the full Janspeed kit by the first owner within a couple of years of buying it.
Bill has owned a few other Jaguars. In fact, after he sold his Jaguar XJ12 in 2018, he found himself pining for another and, when the XJ-S came up for sale, he could not resist it. Having just sold the V12, he was not expecting much from the six-cylinder car other than more reliability and it being cheaper to keep on the road. Naturally, he had heard of the influence Janspeed had on the marque, but it was not until he took the car for a test drive that he became aware of just how superior it was to the car he had just sold. The price of a second-hand Janspeed XJ-S and that of a standard 3.6 XJ-S is quite comparable, making the Janspeed version an incredible bargain, even more so in comparison with other performance classic cars — or even modern cars, for that matter — which cost far more bucks for the bang.

The writing on the wall

25 September, 2026

Deven, a digital content producer in his 20s, says it was the rear-drive Nissan and Toyota drift cars that fired his imagination in his not-so-distant youth and soon had him wanting one of his own. However, like most of us, he had to start in something less glamorous – in his case, a 1997 Mitsubishi Galant. After that, he bought a four-litre V8 1991 Toyota Soarer, a big change from the Mitsubishi.
“It was my daily driver, and it wasn’t that bad to run back when petrol was affordable,” he says.
When he got fed up with filling it up, Deven bought a 1989 Ford Laser sedan, a 1.3-litre five-speed manual, to be his daily driver. It’s in very good condition, bought from a careful older driver, and he still runs it – although he will occasionally also drive the latest in a series of Nissan Laurel sedans. His current one, from 1993, has done the lowest number of kilometres yet, at 183,000. It has the single-cam version of the engine in his Skyline.
“I’ve had four different versions of that car. It was just a car I always liked. It’s really comfortable, quite luxurious. I bought it from a 90-year-old in Hamilton. It’s in mint condition, and everything is standard.”

Ferrari lovers take note: Ferrari 288 GTO to be auctioned in Monterey

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