Adil Kurji’s 1958 MGA

I’ve thought about this for a while now and from what I’ve seen, I think everyone deserves to see something special today.

Now, I’m not saying the cars featured before aren’t; so far, we have been blessed with cars exquisitely personalized, slammed to their hearts content, and can hit mind-boggling speeds.

This car is neither of those; it has been kept stock and on paper, it’s not considered ‘fast’ in today’s standards. If you want ‘fast’, check out Ryan’s MR2 or this GT3.

Despite all this, there’s just something about it that just made me… Speechless.

If you do not enjoy this car, then you’re not a true petrolhead. I will take that quote with me to the grave.

I present to you the 1958 MG MGA. It is the type of car that started the roadster niche and spawned to create the booming British automobile history consisting the likes of Triumph, Lotus, Austin Healey, etc. The roadster can also be held responsible for the inception of the Mazda Miata.

This 1958 MGA only had 3 owners in its lifespan. The second owner had it since 1967 till my friend, Adil Kurji, took it off his hands in late 2009.

When I first saw her, I was flabbergasted; here was a car as old as my dad and it still looks immaculate. I’m sure that if she could talk, she would tell me countless stories. For one, this car has seen majority of Canada as the second owner drove it from Ontario to Calgary after graduating in high school.

Exterior wise, it’s absolutely pretty. It has soft curves which hugs your line of view and its small ride height shows what ‘slammed’ is before ‘slammed’ was cool. It warms your heart with every glance.

Granted, it has battle scars of yesteryear accumulated throughout its lifetime; the right quarter panel has scratches from the second owner crashing through barbed wire while autocrossing backwards. Blindfolded. True story.

Now this is not the twin cam version which apparently destroys itself from the inside out. This is the 1489cc engine, which is enough to move this lightweight around corners but will struggle in the highway, especially with its 4 speed manual tranny. This is a cruiser, meant to enjoy the sun and to appreciate how lucky you are to drive this special gem.

When Adil took me out for a test drive, it was a special moment for me; for the first time in my life I was in car, grinning from ear to ear, giggling like a schoolgirl.

The moment I heard that rumble, goosebumps just went all over my body. It was pure heaven. If I punched a bear square in the face and lived to tell about it, it’s half of what I felt that night. Now I know how those rally drivers felt back then. Driving around downtown was a thrill of its own as I enjoyed the endless skies with the roof down. The radio was barely audible through its mono speaker as I became one with the car.

Now this MGA is not practical as it has limited space for another person and maybe, weekend luggage in the trunk. Whatever.

If you wanted to be sensible, you would have bought a normal car. End of story. People buy these roadsters because they are eccentric and fun.

It didn’t matter that the fuel gauge twitches when you hit the throttle down; you didn’t care that to use the speedometer, you had to take the average out between the highest and the lowest recorded speed because it floated. Hell, you wouldn’t even notice that it was in mph.

All these quirks, things that quintessentially defines British automobiles, is what made people fall in love with it.

Now the MGA is not the quickest nor the most agile car around. The faster version hates itself and this MGA also has worn out weather stripping so it leaks when it rains.

And I wouldn’t care. I would buy one of these in a heartbeat and smile at the sunset forever.

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Questions, comments? I’d like to hear from you. Yes, you!

Also, if you’re interesting in seeing more pictures of the car, it’s on my Flickr!

The 20th Anniversary of the Honda NSX

To continue on the NSX week..

Last weekend was the 20th Anniversary of the Honda NSX.
The meet was held during the performance days at the famous Nurburgring.
Special part was a meeting of European based NSXs. A total of 58 cars made it out there.

You must understand the special appearance of the car since at normal meetings, there are a max 15 cars together.

It all started at Saturday morning when most of the NSXs and more Hondas joined up and drove off to the ring. Must be an awesome thing to drive there with a lot of those cars.

Sunday morning everybody showed up at the GP Strecke.

Everybody parked up together and then it was time for photo’s and a loot of catching up between the owners.

Since I know you guys also like the ladies, so at this point I’ll just shut up and let you enjoy the rest of the pictures.

Also a cool example of how a Ringracer should look like.

Thank you Dimer, once more for the shots.

Random Saturday

Usually I spent my Saturdays with the girlfriend or at the local shop, who’s owned by 2 good friends and their dad.

Since I first had to pick some things up, I was there when most of the locals already went to the beach… But the small parking lot still had a few cars left.

This is where most of my friends cars are being modified and where new friends are made.
Usually that occurs when someone orders something at their shop and it is being fitted at a Saturday. That is when the magic happens. I dropped by about 3 years ago still being fresh and new to the scene and with a broken engine. Two weeks later, new engine and good to go to France. This place just injects you with this virus of Honda-love and the thrill of a good handling and fast car.

One of the cars in their garage is this fine example of a DC5 Integra Type-R.
Because we don’t have the LHD Acura RSX in Europe, the only way is to get you an JDM imported one. The owner did a good job finding one with some Mugen goodies and a Backyard special front bumper.

Another good example for the Honda love is this 3th Gen Honda Civic. It is as stock as you can find her in a very good and rust-free condition.

The picture above shows my good friend and salesman Martijn holding the new turbo + Manifold for an new project boosting an R34 GTT Skyline from the stock horses up to the 400 bhp.

And last but least, here is the colorful hood of my mechanic’s CRX.
Since the car still had the 2001 Fast and The Furious styling, we had to put on some stickers.

I Hope you guys enjoyed the weekend ? I sure did and next week we’ll have a somewhat bigger Honda meeting in Holland, So expect more.

iM: Updates from overseas

Howdy,

I have been reading illmotion for a while and spotted the quest for new people.
Emailed Jason right away and after a small talk, I was part of the family.

Since I live in a small country in Europe, it’s quite difficult to post pictures of meetings in Canada.
But we also have our own community, events and meetings in the Netherlands + the famous Nurburgring is only 3,5 hour driving for me.

After owning a 95 Honda EG hatchback for 3 year, this was the year to step-up to the game of faster cars and bought a imported Integra Type-R

What can you expect from me ? Well i have this awesome Nikon D90 camera and take it with me almost all the time. If it is for a local drive, chillin’ with friends, big meetings, road trips to the Nurburgring or even international events. I’ll try to give you an impression of what we got in Europe.

But first some more pictures…





For those who want to see more of my previous work, please have a look at my Flickr stream.
And for more information about myself, you can check out my own small blog about the Integra and of course my Twitter ( @L4urenZ )

Cheers,

Laurens