THAT 'E' AND ME

ROB HAS BITTER-SWEET PANTOMIME PERFORMANCE MEMORIES OF HIS MORALE-BOOSTING THAT ACHIEVED A SURPRISING OUTCOME.

- ROB BLACKBOURN

A BRIEF reference by Cliff Chambers' in a recent Unique Cars Market Watch feature to an E-Type Jaguar coupe immediately caught my eye. Standing out from the rest of the paragraph as if set in bold type were these words: "delivered new in 1962... in Fiji... 61 years later still in original ownership".

E-Types have always made me sit up and take notice. Even with the first examples still on the water from the UK in 1961 the press was running headlines with attention-grabbing messages like: "NEW 150MPH JAGUAR COMING" For some teenage petrolheads like me the 100mph mark (160km/h), the magic 'Ton, was always on your mind. You knew you really needed to do it and you'd get there one day, whether down on the tank of a quick motor bike or behind the wheel of a powerful car. You knew it was achievable, and it was up there aspirationally with losing your virginity. Against that background the publicity about a car with 150mph potential was gobsmacking. Clearly totally out of reach, but gobsmacking...

Then the E-Type landed and it looked amazing, oozing performance DNA inherited from the multiple Le Mans winning D-Types. My limited technical knowledge at that stage meant that a detailed appreciation of its design excellence was beyond me, but that understanding came eventually.