What would you do with this?

[John Turner]

One of the off track stars for Kev and myself at the recent LMC event was this 1937 Adler Super Trumpf, an ex Le Mans car. For us it just seemed to sum up what the old racing car movement and this event in particular was all about. The car, I now learn from the September issue of Classic and Sports Car was in 'as found' condition and went on to win the Heritage Club's 'Best of show'. Now, in what is probably a bit of a role reversal, Kev thinks that it should be left in this condition, whereas I would like to see it sympathetically (but not over) restored. I have 'a thing' about old racing cars never being retired and that they should always be used for the purpose for which they were built, and with certain notable exceptions, not disappearing into museums or private collections. John Ruston has noted the reduction in races for prewar cars, and I fear that such races will disappear altogether, which would be a huge shame and not a situation easily recovered from. We should keep these cars running for as long as possible and you could view historic racing as a sort of active and working museum for them.

So there are really two issues here. What do you think should happen to the Adler, and secondly, what is your view generally about pre war racing cars, all now 70 years old or more? Should we be trying to keep them on the tracks for as long as possible, or is it time to accept that through their age (and in some cases, their value) we should accept that race events for them will continue to diminish until very little is left. The VSCC in the UK clearly has an important role to play, but interestingly, although they do cater for PVTs, I don't think, but stand to be corrected, that they allow closed cars in their races, so cars like the Adler would not be catered for anyway.