Three stunning cars to watch at RM’s Monterey sale

Don’t forget to pack your chequebook. Just those three cars are expected to make around $45 million. In fact, with a sprinkling of Ferraris, the top 10 lots alone could be worth an astonishing $125 million.

And this is just the RM Sotheby’s sale, one of three big auctions over the weekend of 15-17^th August that come at the end of a week of automotive splendour celebrated every year in and around the Monterey peninsula south of San Francisco. (We have already previewed the top lots Bonhams will be offering at its Quail Lodge Auction – go and have a read if you haven’t already!)

Apart from the first 1939 Porsche Type 64, the one-of-only-two Le Mans-spec McLaren F1s and an original 007 DB5 to Goldfinger spec, what will RM Sotheby’s be offering? Here’s our top three lots from an amazing star-studded list of over 180 cars…

1962 Ferrari 250 California SWB Spyder, $10.5-13 million

You’re in California, the sun’s shining and the Pacific Coast Highway beckons… what else would you take for a brisk drive but a Cali Spyder?

This is the 55^th of 56 SWB convertibles ever built and has had just four owners over the past 50 years, the most recent since 1994. RM calls this fab Ferrari the most original and unmolested surviving example of the illustrious breed, plus it is one of the covered-headlight examples that collectors love best.

It also has Ferrari Classiche certification confirming its engine, gearbox, differential, and other components right down to its Borrani wire wheels are all as originally fitted to the car when it left the factory in 1962. The 280bhp V12 powered two-seater has covered 88,491km over its lifetime – plenty of life left then for that run up the Californian coast…

1965 Ford GT40 Roadster Prototype, $7-9 million

This is the prototype GT40 convertible, the first of five roadsters built in period and the only one thought to have survived in its original form.

It was built for Shelby American as a test and development car and was driven by Carroll Shelby and Jim Clark. Another claim to fame is that Shelby gave hot laps to Henry Ford II in this car, thought to have been the only time the Ford boss got to ride in a GT40. The car, with its roadster specific chassis, was also tested at Silverstone by Sir John Whitmore and Dickie Attwood.

And where was this beauty built? That would be Slough! RM believes it to be the first example built at the Ford Advanced Vehicles after the exit of Lola’s Eric Broadley.

1953 Aston Martin DB3S Works, $8.75-10.3 million

Important slices of motorsport history are rarely more beautiful, or successful, than this. Yup, we’re saving the best (for us, anyway) ‘til last – an Aston Martin DB3S from the golden era of sports car racing.

The car up for grabs is the second of 10 surviving Aston works cars and the actual machine that won the Goodwood Nine Hours in 1953. Reg Parnell, partnered by Eric Thompson, brought DB3S/2 home two laps ahead of the nearest non-Aston competition, one of the Ecurie Ecosse Jaguar C-Types.

The car went on to compete in many of the world’s most gruelling events – Le Mans, Sebring, Buenos Aires, the Mille Miglia – at the hands of some motorsport’s greatest drivers, not just Parnell but also Roy Salvadori and most famously Peter Collins. Collins loved the car so much he bought it from the factory and kept racing it. It was partly down to his success in this car that Ferrari signed him.

With many of the works DB3S suffering racing damage and being rebuilt and updated in period, DB3S/2 has remained highly original, with its drop-dead gorgeous looks true to how designer Frank Feeley drew them in the 1950s.

In recent times DB3S/2 has been a regular historic racer at events including the Goodwood Revival, as well as being a star of the concours lawns. Then as now, it also makes a stonking road car, and it still wears the UDV 609 registration number that Peter Collins gave it all those years ago.

Photography courtesy of RM Sotheby's.