Chris,
The meeting was outside the Herald Sun building at Southbank in the middle of Melbourne. The hotel he , BMW and Ferrari team were staying at is next door. Oh the Holden top brass were staying there also.
The Herald Sun are doing a spread on our cars and their head of motoring wanted to drive the car. He asked me to bring a car to their building for 8.30 and I did. We went for an hour long drive in the peak hour traffic and when we returned Tom was leaving the hotel. Paul Gover knows Tom Walkinshaw and they spoke. Tom was asking what Paul was doing there and he said that he was driving one of our cars, so Tom had a look, a real good look. He had a good look in the engine bay and also the passengers compartment and made some comments. I was very happy to here them and even more happy to meet the man whose company designed and built the Jaguar XJR 19, one of my all time favourite cars. The designer of that car moved to McLaren and was responsible for the F1 another one of my favourites and very similar in design. I now wonder what could have been if Jaguar had kept the designer, Peter Stevens, and he had an open book with the XJ220. A chance lost for Jaguar I think !!!!
For those interested the full story is due to press in two weeks, the Friday after the 40 th. anniversity of the launch of our beloved GT40's at the Detroit Motor Show (1st. April 1964). We also have a segment on the "Car Show" with Glen Ridge on Saturday 1st. May 2004 on Channel 9 .
I still am ammazed at the doors that these cars open. I doubt any other car would have presuaded Tom to have another look.
Best wishes,
Robert
