Convoy! CAR's seminal drive story appeared in our February 1977 issue. We drove a trio of Lamborghinis – the Countach, Silhouette and Urraco – from Sant'Agata to London
CAR's great drives: Convoy! Part 1
By
Mel Nichols
28 August 2008 17:00
Mel Nichols penned one of CAR's most celebrated drive stories: Convoy, published in February 1977. It was a never-to-be-forgotten journey in a convoy of Lamborghinis – the Countach, Silhouette and Urraco. Read the full, original story over the next few pages. Only at CAR Online
It had the unreal quality of a dream. That strange hyper-cleanliness, that dazzling intensity of colour, that haunting feeling of being suspended in time, and even in motion; sitting there with the speedo reading in excess of 160mph and two more gold Lamborghinis drifting along ahead.
Not even those gloriously surreal driving scenes from Lelouche’s A Man And A Woman were like this: that grey, almost white ribbon of motorway stretching on until it disappeared into the sharp, clear blue of a Sunday morning in France, mid-autumn, and those strange dramatic shapes eating it up.
What a sight from the few slower cars as that trio came and went! What a sight from the bridges and the service areas: they would have seen the speed! So would the police, of course, those same gendarmes who one after another apparently chose to look and drink it in, to savour it as an occasion rather than to act.
We hadn’t intended to travel so quickly when we left Modena with 1000 miles ahead of us. That we should, given the build-up, the delicious crispness of that early morning, the perfection of that road – and those cars – was inevitable; not to have done so would have been appalling now, for it was only a short time later that the French imposed their speed limits with a savage new will and such adventures may never be possible again. Yes, in German, in theory: but on those narrow German autobahns with their bumps…?
We arrived in Modena on Thursday night, spilling, tired, from an ailing Avis Fiat 131 hired with great difficulty at Milan airport: nothing has changed. For some inexplicable reason all the hotels in Modena were booked out, even our quiet little favourite the Castello out among the vineyards. Not even the talents of the desk clerk at the Real Fini could secure us a bed.
We lounged for an hour in his bar, glad to rest, while he telephoned. But Roger Phillips had a trump card: a key to the flat of Rene Leimer, the owner of Lamborghini, and we set off in the clapped Fiat again, weaving along backroads until we stopped at a trattoria in a village near Sant’Agata.
It was two in the morning but the place was still in full swing and Carlo the owner greeted Phillips like a long-lost brother and it was but moments until we had an excellent four-course dinner in front of us! No bill: there would be a grand reckoning when it was all over. And with that, we tumbled off to Monsieur Leimer’s beds, thankful that he was in Switzerland and thus spared the embarrassment of four guests.
Click 'Next' to continue reading CAR's original Convoy! story from 1977
