“You only ride like a Pacer if you’re wide like a Pacer” If you’re among the many who laugh at AMC Pacers, let us introduce you to “Weird” Harrel Lamkin of Ruston, LA. He drag-raced a 550-hp Pacer from 1987 to 1996, turning 10-second quarter miles at 124 mph. As […]
Author: Paul Duchene
Paul grew up in England and has been riding, driving (and mostly writing about) cars and motorcycles since 1958, when he bought a 1939 James Autocycle for $5. He’s written for daily newspapers and magazines for 40 years, including the Chicago Tribune and New York Times, and has owned upwards of 200 cars and 30 motorcycles, most of which survived to be sold. His daily driver is a 1984 Cadillac Seville in Palomino Firemist, but on sunny days you’ll find him grinning over the windshield of a 1968 Siata Spring.
1967-1969 Saab Sonett II
Above 3,000 rpm driving a Sonett II is like hanging onto an out-of-control chainsaw The words “Swedish” and “sports car” seem entirely uncomfortable bedfellows. But back in the 1950s, before Saab and Volvo had acquired the safe-and-sane reputations that still accompany their current American parents, both companies set off to […]
1968 Riley Elf Mk III
The Elf was designed to appeal to older “Buick and Oldsmobile” customers, with a miniature vertical grille, leather interior and a strange projecting trunk that pretty much ruined the Mini’s perfectly cute lines A luxury Mini blessed with marginally greater trunk space and an improved interior, the Riley Elf (along […]
1962 Citroën 2CV Sahara 4×4 Sedan
Two engines at different ends of the car, two carburetors, two gearboxes, two ignition keys: It’s a miserable thing to drive. I should know, as I owned one and commuted in it daily for six years The slab-sided, roll-top Citroën “Deux-Chevaux” was conceived as a people’s car, a front-wheel […]