Who here has watched Old Top Gear, and could pick classic James May — Chris Goffey — out of a police line-up? And who here religiously trawls classified car listings, hoping to discover some completely odd, underpriced car, desperate to be saved?
Today, I have something special. Rarely do we ever get a weird car story so neatly bookended, at least for now: a high high, followed by an irrefutably downward trajectory.
Featured on Top Gear when new-ish in approximately 1987, the Lea Francis Ace of Spades wasn’t your typical neo-classic pretender. It was an honest attempt at resurrecting a fine British brand — with a teased sedan stablemate to come.
A twist is that Lea Francis’ new steward, Barrie Price, determined to uphold the marque’s storied tradition, encouraged his team to design as many components in-house as possible.
1980 Lea Francis Ace of Spades coupe • Lea Francis
Kinda like BYD, except… Here, it was with vastly fewer resources, selling to a rapidly changing luxury car market, with the reality being a Lea Francis would be hand-made by necessity because it didn’t have modern production facilities behind it.
While sitting among these flames, I say: “This is fine”. This is because in that Top Gear report, Price courageously admitted:
“Oh, it’s a financial disaster, but one has to do something in this life…”
Respect.
This post is for subscribers only
Sign up now to read the post and get access to the full library of posts for subscribers only.
