‘Tank’ that elevates you with the Riviera’s glitterati

The 1978 Monteverdi Safari yours for about $150,000.

Pip pip readers!

It’s the kiddies’ school holidays so I know you are off this week to Juan-les-Pins with your carefully designed topless swimsuit (for men), and of course when the snow falls, you’re found in St. Moritz, with the others of the Cottesloe/Medindie/middle class park/Double Bay/ Teneriffe (no, the one in the loser’s maroon city of Brissie) jetset.

But can I suggest you and the ankle biters forgo the Pam Pam and head instead to Acturial’s garden party in St. Tropez today. It lacks the gorgeous Brazilian dancers in bright, exotic costumes and the Botox-infused faces but it does have Rubens Barrichello’s 2002 Spa Grand Prix original racing suit (and wouldn’t you be a hit at the Riviera’s Pam Pam bar in this?) for $5000 and Michael Schumacher’s original Ferrari F-2002 Sabelt seat belt (just imagine putting Schuey’s seat belt on your head, with Ruebens’ racing suit on your bod and carrying the Ferrari 550 Maranello set of five luggage bags under the Warwicks and walking into Pam Pam on 137 Boulevard Président Wilson … seriously the musos would drop their pandeiros, the samba dancers lose their feather shawls and the place would go off with you the central character.)

Baggage and seat belt combo $10,000.

OK you need something flash to turn up in Pam Pam. Eye king John Kennedy could lend you his Macan Turbo but nothing says class more than a 2021 Mercedes-Benz special obsidian black twin-turbocharged V8, 800bhp, G63 600kw Brabus.

Readers before you say it looks like a German Tank, which is true, just think about this: you get an integrated actively controlled exhaust flap, with a stainless sports exhaust system with two black chromed side pipes on each vehicle side that offer an electronically controlled sound management with a choice between a discreet “Coming Home” mode or a markedly sporty “Pulling Up At Bar Amelie” V8 sound.

Don’t tell me you haven’t got the Gregory Peck book out right now and already started practising your best version of voulez-vous coucher avec moi?

But if you don’t like Mercs, don’t despair because over at the Golf Country Club de Bonmont, (Route de Bonmont, Cheserex Gnomeland) Bonhams is offering the 1978 Monteverdi Safari with Coachwork by Carrozzeria Fissore. Never heard of it? Let’s face it (pun intended), all you want to buy is a South Yarra tractor, a red Peppermint Grove Porsche Cayenne GT3 or a Double Bay Urus (no, it’s not a body part left over from your mini effort, maxi effect Botox, filler at spakfilla treatments at Dr Dorian Gray’s Bay Street surgery).

Peter Monteverdi was a Gnome racing driver, F1 team owner, car builder and founder of the very small Swiss luxury car brand Monteverdi. And he was a mechanic and a new and used car salesperson for Ferrari. In 1976 he launched the Safari based on the International Harvester Scout – that was re-bodied by Italian coachbuilder Fissore and came with a huge V8 with more luxury items than Lady Godiva (the horse rider not the pub) had hair.

It has a “Brionvega Algol portable television set designed by Richard Sapper and Marco Zanuso that sits proudly between the rear seats atop a capacious fridge capable of holding sufficient champagne to preserve the life of all occupants in the event” of the Coopers running out. Good buying at $150k.

Talking of the Austrian GP tomorrow reminds me of the Spanish GP last weekend. The dirty little secret about Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya (scene of last weekend’s drive to survive and try to keep your job as a highly paid jockey) is that it is where the F1 circus spends its winter so the drivers know this track really well and more importantly it allows the teams to benchmark their cars real performance.

Anyway, the top cars are getting closer and Sunday’s race really showed who the top drivers are: Mad Max, Leaping Lando, the Hamster and Gorgeous George. This is going to sound weird given Max is only 26 but Lando and George made and keep making young person’s mistakes.

“We were the quickest, we had the best car, And I didn’t maximise it. The start is down to me and doing what I got told and executing that. Without that, or with a good start, we easily should have won” LL told me via the physic telex. Remember this is the same LL who, after Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, said, after finishing first of the losers: “One or two more laps and I think I would have had him”.

But the reality is that its Norris and McLaren that have made F1 watchable again. Whatever McLaren has done, it’s seen the team improve faster than anyone else including Mad Max.

And don’t forget that in Spain on Saturday the McLaren paddock home caught fire and LL had to run out in his sockies.

Red Bull and McLaren have the fastest cars but Mercedes is slowly getting there. Ferrari’s race strategy is nuts. Spain looks certain to lose the GP and Türkiye, the country formally known as Turkey, to win it. More on the driver market next week.

Can’t afford the trip to Austria this weekend? Then head down to the Steve Cottee-owned Pheasants Wood where your correspondent will be doing his best in the Deputy Cheap Car Challenge and 4 hour Enduro with the Lando Norris of Canberra, Ronin Lindenmayer, driving the more important shifts.

And on desperate times in EV land, VW will pay up to $8bn to get half of Rivian.

What is Rivian? “Rivian exists to create products and services that help our planet transition to carbon neutral energy and transportation.”

Let me translate. Rivian makes EVs, has a nice website and has been losing money faster than lithium batteries burn down your house and faster than the price of lithium has been falling because there’s so much supply.

Rivian’s stock has been as low as $10 and VW’s as low as $167 (this week when they announced the deal). Bottom line as the WSJ says: “Rivian gets cash, VW gets the complex software necessary to create cutting-edge EVs.” More madness next week.

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