Time, after a quick breakfast in the Sunbeam Café, to wander round the cars. My eye is immediately caught by an Imp-powered Ginetta G15 in yellow and, opposite it, a late Austin 1300 also in yellow. These BMC ADO16 cars, once Britain's best sellers, have had their numbers savagely culled by rust so it's good to see a survivor. The rare MG 1300 and the Austin or Morris 1300GT versions are starting to become quite collectable now, and they were always good fun to drive.
Nearby is an even more forgotten piece of popular British history in the form of a Hillman Hunter, and then my eye is drawn to the familiar yet subtly different lines of a 1964 Coune MGB. Belgium's Coune coachwork company created its own version of a fastback GT two years before BMC released its factory version, and the changes went some way beyond a new, integral roof. The windscreen was very deep, the wheelarches gained lipped edges and even the headlamp recesses got an extra inner flare. Fifty-six Coune MGBs were made of which just a dozen or so survive.
And then, just beyond a Brooklands shed, I spy a car remarkably like the one in which I have arrived but painted in a curious pinky beige and breathtakingly immaculate. It was restored, perfectly, in Sweden before being acquired by famous Surrey dealer Bell & Colvill (it sold new Saabs when such a thing was still possible) and displayed proudly in its showroom. From there it was bought by former racing driver Ray Armes who loves it to bits, whitewall crossply tyres and all. Ray used to race Imps, so his interests and mine align remarkably closely. Cue mutual admiration of each other's Saabs, envy on my part of his car's un-pitted boot handle and pristine engine bay, intrigue on his part as to why mine has vent holes in the rear shelf and his doesn't…
More examination of curious old European cars with tiny engines comes when we stumble upon a Panhard PL17, another car destined for my imaginary Top 20 garage. Its owner is fiddling under the bonnet, revealing the giant polished-aluminium fan cover in front of the 848cc flat twin, and now he's starting it up to the accompaniment of nearly as much smoke as our two-stroke, three-cylinder Saabs generate even though the Panhard is a four-stroke. It also has a perfect reproduction Venetian blind in the rear window, made to the original Panhard-accessory pattern.