Ford Festiva & Aspire 1988 Thru 1997 All Models Haynes Repair on 2040-parts.com

The best bits of Monterey Car Week 2014: a Pebble Beach photo gallery

CAR’s Ben Oliver is just back from the races, auctions and shows of Monterey Car Week, culminating in the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. Here’s his completely unrepresentative photo-diary: as you’ll see, he got most excited by the oddball Concours de LeMons… The standard of restoration required to exhibit at the Concours de LeMons is a little lower than at the other Monterey Car Week events. This is the kind of thing you see parked on the street during Monterey Car Week: the Blastolene Brothers Dream Rod, with its 2000bhp, 41-litre Packard tank engine.

New Volkswagen Golf is European Car of the Year

The new Volkswagen Golf Mk 7 is the European Car of the year for 2013, polling twice as many votes as the second place Toyota GT86 (and Subaru BRZ). Last year we had the Vauxhall Ampera voted as European Car of the Year, a verdict we called ‘Completely Stupid’. And in 2011 it was the Nissan LEAF that took the Car of the Year Gong.

Aston Martin DBS from 'The Persuaders!' heads to auction

James Bond wasn't the only British fictional character associated with cars from Newport Pagnell, even though the MI6 agent did drive Aston Martins in a number of films. But James Bond films weren't the only medium in which Aston Martin cars appeared. If you watched the opening of the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London, you might have noticed one TV series not referenced in the opening show: "The Persuaders!" starring Roger Moore (a Bond actor himself) along with Tony Curtis.