Head Turner

- Jon Cass

The R53 MINI Cooper S has been around some time now and we’ve seen many modified examples over the years. That comes as no great surprise as the R53 lends itself to modifications so well, it’s reasonably cheap to purchase a decent project base and there’s a plethora of aftermarket parts available for it. Yet the dream of some owners is to take their car to another level, to create something that hasn’t been done previously, to think outside of the box, so to speak. For 22 year old Brad Kitching, his latest R53 project had to be like no other that had been seen before.

Now, Brad’s no stranger to modifying cars, beginning when he was just 16 with a 1.4 Corsa. “I spent thousands on it, installing a full boot build, carbon bonnet, roof and boot,” he remembers. “Sadly by the time I’d passed my test I found I couldn’t afford to insure it, so it made way for a SEAT Arosa!” This too was ripe for modification and had 9J banded steels fitted, another custom boot build, but the engine went pop soon after. Things weren’t looking good, but Brad managed to land himself a job as a car salesman which meant he had access to various company cars. “I ran those for a while and used to remove the air filters to make them sound a bit louder,” he laughs.

There’s a limit to what can be done to a company car without getting into trouble with your boss of course, so Brad decided he needed a weekend toy that he could get to grips with and take that little bit further. “I wanted something fast and cheap, so I started looking at MINIs,” Brad recalls. “I managed to find a MINI One with an engine conversion which ticked all the right boxes.” Again, this was treated to a few choice mods and Brad drove it for over two years, but non-stop problems sealed its fate and the One was broken for parts to fund his next project.