Words: Alex Wakefield
Photos: Alex Wakefield/Petrolblog/Wikipedia/Greenmotor.co.uk/Myclassicuk.com
Being essentially worthless, nobody bothered to preserve them
Let’s assume, given where you’re reading this, that you already know about the Hagerty Festival of the Unexceptional (FOTU). The diametric opposite of, say the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este, here mediocrity matters most.
Nostalgia is big business. You’ll have seen the classified ads where someone has uncovered a 1994 VW Polo 1.0 Fox in their great aunt’s garage, polished it up and pitched it with an ambitious price tag just in time for this year’s FOTU.
Clunkers, lemons, chod. Cars we used to laugh at, but which are now solid gold. Parked on the lawn either side of Grimsthorpe Castle’s endless driveway, for one day in July an almost ecclesiastical hush descends on thousands of old motors that have finally found their place.
The annual Concours de l’Ordinaire focuses on fifty cars that meet the judging criteria. Previous winners have included a Śkoda Favorit, Toyota Hilux, Vauxhall Astra and a Daihatsu Applause. An eclectic bunch of vehicles, without doubt.
Everyone who has visited will have spent their journey home pondering what they’d need to bring next year, to be crowned a winner. This is a topic as divisive as modern politics, and until now, it has been impossible to reach a consensus on what combination of obscurity, rarity, mediocrity and lunacy guarantees a rosette.
Let’s take a look at five cars you have probably forgotten about, which have the potential to scoop up the silverware:
FOTU Concours de l’Ordinaire Dream Shortlist
- Rover 2400SD Turbo
- VW Golf Ecomatic
- Talbot Tagora
- SAO Penza
- SEAT Malaga
Rover 2400SD Turbo
Everyone, even those who have actually owned one and been forced to enter/exit by way of the sunroof because the doors won’t open, loves a Rover SD1. Stationary, by the side of the road, they look great. When they work, they’re a pleasure to pilot; even the base level 2000 with the BL O-Series four pot engine can put a smile on your face, if it’s in motion.
But there’s a special place for the 2400 SD Turbo. A pioneering diesel powered executive car, it sold in tiny numbers in the UK and most other places. Equipped with a laggy, high-maintenance four cylinder engine originally intended for marine use, it flopped. This combined with the SD1’s legendary ability to self-destruct meant that until recently, it was thought none had survived.
How Many Left begs to differ, though. If you can find one of the three cars still taxed before July 2026, congratulations; you’re a winner – and in more ways than one.
VW Golf Ecomatic
The Golf Mk3 was about as dull as they ever came. Whilst the GTI models weren’t exactly scintillating, the lowly models further down the range were underpowered, stodgy and entirely unremarkable. The Golf Ecomatic however, is as intriguing as it is rare.
Visually identical to a Golf in CL trim, the Ecomatic was fitted with a naturally aspirated version of the 1.9 litre VW diesel engine. Once inside though, you’d wonder why there were only two pedals, and a manual gearbox. In the Ecomatic, the clutch was automated as part of an early, innovative start-stop system which was an ancestor of today’s tech.
With two batteries to power the system, the Ecomatic weighed around the same as a Golf Mk7, and cost 15% more than the standard diesel version. That, combined with the complexity and vibration from a diesel constantly dying and restarting meant nobody bought them. Only single figures remain. If you can bag one, obscurity will ensure a prize is yours.
Talbot Tagora
The most remarkable thing about the Tagora, is that any exist at all. It’s unlikely you’ll ever have seen one of these large, angular, French-built saloons, as they failed to make any impact in 80s showrooms. Rust quickly claimed the small number that did find homes in northern Europe.
Fitted with either a 2.2 litre inline four petrol, a PRV V6 (the same type used in the DeLorean), or a 2.3 litre turbodiesel, only around 20,000 mid-tier executives felt that the Tagora met their needs better than a Ford Granada, Citroën CX or Audi 100.
If you manage to locate one and bring it to FOTU, you can be very confident that you’ll be the only one behind the wheel of this Talbot. Get it behind the gates and railings of the Concours enclosure, and you can also be confident in going home with some silverware, and serious respect from visitors.
SAO Penza
A legend in obscure car circles, nobody has seen a Penza in the wild for years. That’s because there’s only one left in the country, and it’s currently SORN, on the side of a road near Worthing.
You can be forgiven for not knowing that the Penza was a rebadged version of the mid 80s Mazda 323, built in South Africa. Few were sold in the UK during the early 1990s, and those which found a home succumbed to the usual Mazda enthusiasm for corrosion. Being essentially worthless, nobody bothered to preserve them.
Except that single car. If you can find it and convince the owner to sell, FOTU victory is assured.
SEAT Malaga
Having made that bold statement about the SAO Penza, there is another challenger. The SEAT Malaga was sold in hatchback and saloon forms in the UK through the 1980s, although nobody noticed.
Consequently, the Malaga is another car where there’s only one known to exist in Britain. The person who owns it regularly fends off people trying to sneak photos over their fence, as it slowly returns whence it came, dissolving back into the earth.
If you don’t fancy a project, you could hop on a flight to Greece where survivors are more common. Over there, they were renamed Gredos, because the word Malaga translated to something very rude in Greek. Malaga, or Gredos; show up at FOTU in one, and you’ll be king for a day.
What would be your ultimate FOTU lineup? Let us know below.
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If you’re looking for cover for your pride and joy, why not consider Hagerty UK? Not only are we classic car insurance specialists, but we are enthusiasts at heart. Call us for a quote on 0333 323 1138.
