The Heveningham Concours was founded in 2016 and has quickly become one of the UK’s finest annual motor car and aeroplane shows. Held at Heveningham Hall in Suffolk where around fifty remarkable cars are displayed on the spectacular grassy garden terraces.
Heveningham Concours also incorporates the Horsepower Hill, a run on the estate’s parkland road, as well as the Heveningham Tour, a 50-mile drive for the Concours entrants through the Suffolk countryside with a stop for lunch. The event takes place alongside the annual local Country Fair.
Formula E Notebook was lucky to be a guest at this quintessentially English occasion last weekend, enjoying the atmosphere with like-minded enthusiasts and families amid atypically lovely English summer weather.
The Concours Exhibits
There was plenty for the electric generation to get excited about this year as a collection of outstanding cars included several with remarkable all-electric credentials.
The sensational McMurty Speirling PURE VP1 was a head turner with its twin-electric motor, 1000bhp single speed zip that so enamoured the Goodwood Festival of Speed in 2021 when it smashed the hill record with ex F1 driver Max Chilton at the wheel.
The McMurty can generate 2000kgs of instant downforce thanks to its fans. No, not us! Actual fans mounted in the car, quite akin to the mighty Jim Hall designed Chaparral sports cars of the 1960s and Gordon Murray’s legendary Brabham BT46 from 1978.
With customer cars coming next year, McMurty is clearly a manufacturer on the rise, literally. Earlier this year its managing director Thomas Yates drove the car upside down! No, really! This happened on a specially made rig to evidence the sheer instant downforce this sensational car generates. And who knew that Speirling is an old Irish word for Thunderstorm? Not us!
There was also the otherworldly Lotus Evija and its barely believable quadruple electric motor that gives a 2000bhp delivery. This had 2009 F1 world champion Jenson Button spitting out word soup in his wired appraisal recently, of the car that has to be limited to 217mph.
“The torque is astronomical,” croaked Button.
“But the driveability and the steering let you know you’re in a Lotus; I am amazed by the agility of it.”
Retro Fever Wows
From a racing sensibility there was a rich seam of delights to behold throughout the Capability Brown derived wonder of the Heveningham gardens.
So much to see, and so many gilded macaroons for FEN’s cultural attaché, 11 year-old Ellie Smith, to eat too!
One of the most remarkable exhibits was the gas-turbine powered Lotus 56B, that Emerson Fittipaldi took to eighth place in the 1971 Italian Grand Prix. The all-wheel-drive Colin Chapman inspired experiment had its roots in the Indy 500, a race that the 56B almost won in 1968 with Joe Leonard and Graham Hill.
But the car proved unreliable in F1 and was quickly consigned to Chapman’s wild-idea archive. But it remains an incredibly charismatic racer, resplendent in gold and black, as it whistles its Pratt & Whitney gas turbine powerplant to 650bhp via a single gear-direct drive set-up.
Other racers that caught FEN’s keen eye was the 1990 Lotus Lamborghini, with its ludicrously small cockpit featuring a gear stick blister that had to be put in to ensure the survival of Derek Warwick’s knuckles!
The 1984 Toleman TG184 that gave Ayrton Senna his first Grand Prix podium in Monaco was also displayed, attracting new generations to be told all about the legendary Brazilian and his stellar decade long F1 journey.
There was also a tremendous collection of Porsche’s including the Preston Henn owned Thunderbird Swap Shop supported 956 Group C car from 1984. This finished second in the 1984 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans with John Paul Jnr and local hero Jean Rondeau at the wheel.
Modern day Porsches were also there too. The Porsche 930 TAG Turbo model built by famed preppers Lanzante looked mean and lusty, using the actual powerplants used by Alain Prost in his F1 title years at McLaren in 1985 and 1986.
The Porsche 911 GT3 R Rennsport was an amazing looker, with its 4194cc flat six engine and 6-speed semi-automatic rear-wheel-drive set-up pushing out well over 600bhp.
The Tuthill GTOne monster that is being conceived by Porsche specialist Richard Tuthill and collector Elliot Ross. Based on the astoundingly beautiful 911 GT1 that was so controversial in the mid 1990s in the GT arena.
22 of these re-imaginings are confirmed and all 22 have been snapped up immediately. Production begins this year.
For more on the Heveningham Concours click HERE
FEN thanks Anthony Peacock at Mediaworld and Andy Stobart (with his lovely Panhard)!
