407: The Car Coach Unfiltered with Lauren Fix

Okay, welcome to the Collector Car Podcast. Before we get to our interview, I just thought

I'd give you a quick update. I just returned to Cavalino, and if you're on my newsletter,

you'll know that I saw some really amazing Ferraris. Now, there's one I did not mention

in my newsletter. And if you would like to be on my newsletter, just shoot me a note,

Greg, at thecollectorcarpodcast.com. This last one was the importance of judging cars,

not people, which apparently a lot of folks responded to that comment. So anyways,

it's a lot of fun to do. I try to make it worthwhile. I don't want to waste anyone's time.

So again, just shoot me a note, Greg, at the Collector Car Podcast, your email,

and I will add you to it. But anyways, I covered a bunch of stuff, some cool Ferraris, but there

is one I did not cover. This is a car I thought was really fascinating. And if you did not know

what it was, you probably would have just walked by it thinking it was another 275. Now, what is it?

Well, now after the GTOs were built, the 250 GTOs, there was an evolution. And

Ferrari made three really special cars called the 275 GTB C Speciales. And now, like I said,

there's only three of these. The yellow one is most famously known as a $100 million Ferrari.

That one is owned by the estate of Preston Hinn. It was on display forever in Fort Lauderdale

flea market. There still are some of his cars in that flea market. They still own

that car. And I think I might do an email about how that's the world's most unsellable car. I

won't go into the details right now, but I did chase it for a while with no luck, unfortunately,

but it's still out there. And these cars were made to race at big races such as Le Mans.

So Preston Hinn's is by far the most valuable one, I believe is the most original one out there.

It's actually yellow. And it actually won its class at Le Mans, came, I believe, third or fourth

overall. But this is the one that really got me excited. So there's only three of these in the

world. And this one was sold by Arm Sotheby's back in 2016, around $15 million. Back then,

it was a silver gray. And then it was red when it last showed up at Mecom. A year or two years ago,

Mecom Kissimmee, it was a nose sale around $26 million when it was red. And if you'll notice,

it had the 3D scoops on the front, on the front nose. And it did not sell. Dana Mecom actually

owned the car. He bought it from a big collector in Florida, was unable to sell the car down there.

We'll send it right over to Italy to have it restored. And this is its big debut. Now a couple

things you will notice right off the bat, it does not have the 3D scoops in the front. It turns out

that was not original to the car. It originally came without those. So they fixed that. And then

the color. For those of you watching online, I don't know the official name, but it's like a dark,

dark, dark brown, metallic brown. And that's actually the second color it was born with.

The first color was red, as Ferrari made it. But then approximately a year later,

when it was sold to a customer, the customer requested that it match its GTO. So it was

changed to this color. And it has been Classica certified because this is the first color that

it was when it was bought by an actual customer back in 1964, 1965. So just an incredible car.

These are quite a bit different than not only the 275 GTBs, but also the other competition cars.

This one has ultra thin aluminum bodywork. So yes, these are alloyed, but a really thin alloyed

body, reinforced lightweight chassis, competition specs, suspension, dry sump lubrication,

soup dot v12, producing almost 320 horsepower, close ratio gearbox and extensive weight reduction

throughout. You can also see the side exhaust. I would love to have heard this thing fire up,

but I never did over the weekend. So this is one of my favorite cars. And that's enough about

Cavalino. So let's get to the interview with Lauren and please listen and support my sponsors.

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All right, welcome again to the collector car podcast. Hey, it's Greg Stanley and I have

Lauren fixed with here with me here who is deeper into cars than I think I am. So Lauren,

thank you for coming on the show. Well, thanks for having me. Yeah, we ran into each other and we

kept saying over the last year and a half, we need to get together and do a podcast. So thanks for

having me on. Yeah. And to kick it off, you know, just tell me how are you in cars? I mean, we talked

a little bit ahead of the call here. You mentioned you're going somewhere to test drive some Fords

and then you're I mean, sorry, some Toyotas and you've got a podcast, you've got a radio station,

you got all sorts of stuff. So if you would, for my listeners who maybe don't know who you are,

please give us the full intro as well as kind of where to find you.

Okay, my name is Lauren fixed. It's my real last name. Everyone thinks I made it up. It's FIX.

I married the right guy. My husband is a restorer of cars, but that's how I met him. Actually,

I was always into cars. My father was into cars, but he wasn't into racing. He was into Corvettes.

He started a company called stainless steel brakes. And I worked there as a kid. And my first car

was a Camaro went autocrossing, which sort of led down the racing path. I still race today.

I've raced Transam cars. And now I'm running in the SVRA series with a Mustang that I actually

bought back my original race car. So that should be fun. And we'll hopefully have it at Monterey

if we're accepted. So the racing side is great. And I actually taught my husband how to race,

who raced prototypes in Europe. He run on the Transam series since 2000. So if you see Paul

fixed the second, that is my husband. He restores cars and how we met each other is he had a 65

Shelby and I had an 85 Mustang GT that I modified to look like an SVO. So it was kind of cool.

If you remember the 80s cars and we parked next to each other at a cruise night and

the rest is kind of history. We're both love cars, but we had to find that happy medium. He's

restoring. I'm racing SCCA and the happy medium was vintage, but it's also show cars. So I judge at

the Amelia. I judge at Pebble Beach. I've been to a lot of different shows. I do besides that

what's so weird is I worked for my dad for years and a friend of mine, Craig Singhouse, was on

Motor Week said, Hey, you know, you should be a dealer trainer. And I'm like, I don't even know

what that is. And you train the dealers about the new cars coming out. And I, when you get asked to

do these weird things with your friends, do you don't know what path that'll take you on? Like,

how did you get to your podcast sort of the same kind of thing? Suddenly you're here? Well,

that led me down a path of training the dealers. And I met a lot of media and then I got an

opportunity to be Oprah's automotive expert. So I was her automotive expert from 1996 till the show

ended. I did the live your best life tour. And that opened up a ton of doors. And I'm not Rachel Ray,

you know, I'm not Dr. Oz. I didn't get that path, unfortunately, because she's not really a car

person. But it opened up all the news outlets to calling me from CNN to Fox, MSNBC, CNBC, all of

them. I've worked for literally every show some exists, some don't exist. But I didn't know that

would lead to a DIY show that ran for four years with my co-host Steve Ford, who's a master tech.

And that's his real last name. So it was funny, Ford and fix. So you like Ford?

No, not really one way or the other. I like Ford's. We named our daughter Shelby, hence the Shelby's.

And her daughter's name is Senna after art and Senna the race F1 racer and her son's name is Enzo

after Ferrari. And her husband's into Porsches and so forth. So we're all car people. My son does not

have a car name. But our whole family is all about cars. And the house is literally, it's like going

to a car museum. There's pictures of racing and cars and my desk is covered with car stuff. There's

pictures of cars on the wall behind me. It's just you find your passion. And this is my passion.

And it's not typical for women. I've been through a lot of it's the past president of the North

American car and trick of the year awards. I'm still on the jury. I'm a World Car the year juror

as well. Everything I do is cars, including our radio show called The Drive with Lauren and Carl.

It's syndicated coast to coast. It's Alan Taylor's old radio show, if anyone knows him. Plus I work

for Newsmax, the Blaze, MSN, CBT news. So I work on the industry side as well as the consumer side.

Educating people. And I also do car reviews. So all part of what I do is on car smarts,

which is my YouTube channel. So car coach reports for the news, car smarts for the car reviews.

Wow. You are definitely more into cars than I am. That's absolutely stunning. That's amazing.

All right. So I have some questions here and all the listings for your podcasts and your YouTube

and all that will be in the description if someone would like to check it out. First off,

I got to go back to Oprah. Okay. Any interesting car stories with Oprah?

She doesn't, she's not a car person, but she, when I was on the show the first time,

if you saw anyone who knows me from way back, I did not look like I look like now. I had reddish

curly hair. I was heavier. Man, if there's been a lot of changes, as my husband says,

I married the moth who became the butterfly. It's a good thing I can afford to pay for the

butterfly work. But because I went on not knowing who she was and she had, I knew she had porches,

but she didn't say anything about it, but she usually gets driven around in a suburban.

But she was exactly, people always ask me what she really liked. She is exactly

what you saw on TV. Matter of fact, she is a no BS person. She knows what she wants. She knows

that she wants the final product to look like. And I was honored to work with her. I learned a

lot from her. She was very enlightening. Of course, when she started bringing all the celebrities

on the car stuff, sort of went into a window. Right. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Well,

that's interesting for sure. Now, I have to also go back even further to your husband's

car and your car. I'm a Mustang Shelby guy. I don't think you can see it, but there's a

vintage Shelby banner from the 60s dealership hanging up on my way up there. But so your

husband had a 65 GT 350. We have a couple of them. He has a 65 Shelby GT 350 that he showed at

Amelia one first time ever there. And then he also, we also have some carryover cars,

which are the first 252 cars that are built. We have two of those and we have quite a few 66 cars,

including a four speed Hertz car and automatic Hertz car and a bunch of cars that are under

restoration. So we are 65 66 Shelby people, mostly, although we just picked up a barn,

find 67, which probably won't stay with us long because that's not our specialty.

You're making me want to see your garage. I got to say the Buffalo.

Well, that's awesome. So I have this book coming out called the Enthusiast Guide to

Collector Cars. And I put a little like three paragraphs in about the 65 GT 350 and correct

me if I'm wrong here, but I called it the transcendent Shelby, meaning that

that people from all demographics, you know, earning wages, cars they like, they all appreciate

that car, whether you're have a, you know, a 68 six down there, three speed, you know,

$5,000 Mustang coupe, or if you have a 250 Ferrari GTO, you know, because of the racing

heritage, the European guys love it. The little, you know, the people I hang out with,

they have the cheap little Mustangs love it, you know, is, and I can't think of another car

that checks those boxes because it's such a low entry point to be a part of that family.

And I have someone tell me, well, 911s, I'm like, well, no, there's not an entry level,

911 out there, you know, no, that's not like a 2000s, you know, with the Friday headlights,

that's about as low as you're gonna get. But then you're missing, you know,

you're missing like the blue collar guy that just wants to wrench on something, you know, and so

right anyways, that's why I have a special love in my heart for 65 GT 350s. Not only is it the

iconic Mustang design, but it's the ultimate interpretation of that, right? I agree. I am

with you 100%. I've owned a ton of Mustangs over the years. I've had 68 Shelby's and then

there's a big gap. I'm not a big fan of the bigger cars. We've had a couple of Boss 302s over the

years. But then the 74 to 78s were Mustang twos. They were, I know people love them and I respect

you for that. But just not my thing. I had a 79 Mustang Cobra as my first car. It was a V8. It had

two barrel carburetor on it and the horrible transmission and very small rear end. But in 82,

they said the Boss was back and so that was cool. And of course, 85 was the last year for the

carbureted cars. So I had an 85. I've had an 83. I've had base cars, SVOs. So I've had a lot of

late model cars and we currently own a GT 500, a 350R heritage. That's about it for late models

for late model Mustangs. Yeah. Yeah. And the first V8 Mustang I ever drove was an 86 GT.

So I have a special world port injection. That was a one year deal. Yeah. Yeah. So I have a

special spot in my heart for Fox body Mustangs and I'd love to have an 86. I mean, I'm fine with

the 85 because that's actually a little bit better car. Yeah, better car. And they look pretty much

the same. So they are, they went with the first, the beginning of fuel injection. It's called

Squirrelport and it was not a success. So in 87, they went to real fuel injection. And for those

of you that are really deep dive, I'm into the deep dive. I have an engineering background as

well as a marketing degree. So I really love the heavy tech, but I can't talk. I can't talk heavy

tech because I talk over people's heads. So yeah. Yeah. No, I get it. I get it. I love that kind

of stuff. Well, awesome. Well, I know you're doing so many different things. Give us a little

overview of what your podcast is about, your YouTube channel and some of the stuff you're

up to even today. I know you mentioned Emilia. So let's talk about that a little bit,

but just kind of all the stuff you're in right now. Oh, I'm busy, but I love it. To me, this is,

if you love what you do and do what you love, you never work a day in your life. And so for me,

I wake up every day in a great mood knowing that I'm going to be talking cars one way or the other,

whether it's to you on your show or on our radio show, it's called The Drive. It's on AM and FM

stations coast to coast. It's on 85 different stations. So if you don't, you can't find it,

you can get it in podcasts on all the podcast platforms. It's distributed by Radio America.

And then on top of that, you can also watch it on our The Drive car show on YouTube. And I'm

with my co-host, Carl Brower, who's written for a lot of the different magazines. And we've known

each other for a long, long time. And we're good friends. And we both had the opportunity

to take it over as co-hosts. And it's always good to have someone to talk to just like you

bring guests on, talking to yourself or being the single host is a very, there's only a few

people in history who have been able to do that to keep keep people engaged for the whole time.

It's just best to bring on guests and hear great stories. And we bring guests on and we hope to

have you, Greg, on to talk about his book. That sounds really exciting because a lot of people

have gotten to their point in their life that, you know what, I want to get the car that I want

other than a daily driver. And so your book and the timing is perfect, especially with,

you know, RM auctions being out there, just bringing across an array of cars that are

spectacular and worth going to any show just to look and drool. You know, I think that's people,

people really like that. That's what's amazing about RM Southways. And, you know, like,

you go to the Monterey auction and the cars that are on offer are just some of the stuff you've,

it's a concordant of itself, you know, and it's arguably, in some locations, better than the

concord. It depends, you know, like, it depends what the market is. Yeah, it's just unbelievable.

Yeah. Well, so what kind of topics do you typically cover? Is it mostly new stuff? Do you

go into the old stuff every once in a while? Oh, as far as the radio show, we try to give people,

it's more, we try to keep it on the lighter side because it is radio and we don't know where you

are in the country. You could be literally in Peoria or Los Angeles. And we think about what

information you would need. What's going on? What are the trends? Where can I save money?

Sometimes it's news stories like news stories that are on my Car Coach Reports channel,

like the kill switch subject, which is a law that got passed in 2021 under the infrastructure bill.

And people were very upset about it because it meant that they could make your car undriveable

if the car in its software, not a person, not a, not AI, but the software makes a decision that

possibly you're under the influence of something. So I try to bring those types of stories

as well. We talk about like the FBI just started purchasing BMW X5s instead of Suburbans. Kind of

an interesting story. People want to hear about that. We also bring on guests like Brian Moody,

who is an automotive expert himself, and he's been covering current production cars. So we

talk about him, what's going on, what he's seeing. We have Mike Harley, who's on a regular basis.

And we also have a celebrity car expert who talks about, he actually works with celebrities in

Hollywood. So when the movie comes up, Josh Handcook is the guy. And what they do is they come to him

and say, listen, we're doing a new Maverick movie. What's he driving? And he then reads the script

and decides that you want to put them in this, you're not going to put them in a Hummer EV,

even though GM wants to donate it. That's fine, but it might not be the right mix. So he tries to

help them. He becomes the car expert to the stars. So he's done regularly as well. And of

course, we bring back Ellen Taylor every once in a while when he has time to bring us up to speed

on what he's doing. Wow, that's great. That sounds like an awesome mix of stuff. Now, how do you,

what's the outlet for your car reviews and tell us a little bit about the history there? Is there

some, I know you mentioned Toyota EVs coming up. Is it all new stuff that you review? Is it a

particular segment? Do you do everything? Yeah, the CarSmartz channel, I had to split it from my

regular channel, which has huge numbers, but I think it confused people like you, news stories,

or car reviews. So the car reviews have been moved to CarSmartz, if you go to YouTube. And I cover

everything from the Nissan Centra, which is all new this year, to the Leaf, to the Honda Pilot,

the GMC Terrain, a Genesis G80. We cover Audi's literally every brand, including I just posted

a review on the Dodge Charger Scat Pack, which I got, of course, in the middle of a Buffalo

winter. Now that's the, what, like supercharged six cylinder? Correct. So I know they were EV,

if it had remained an EV only car, probably wouldn't have won North American Car of the year.

But because they put the six cylinder engine in, it made it drivable and fun, a little bit of throwback,

a little bit of future technology. And they just won. And Tim Kaniscus, who runs the Dodge program,

and North American for Stellantis, was so excited that he said, this just proves to my bosses

that people want gasoline powered cars. And so that sort of brought some new light to him and

to Ralph Giles, who you probably had on as a guest, who's a designer for Stellantis. And they're

great guys, they're real car people. And that's what you're starting to see is the car manufacturers

waking up to what consumers want. And we discussed that on our radio show as well.

Wow. That's really great. That's a lot of great stuff you're doing there.

I don't know if you want to answer this question or not, but what's the most recent

best car you've reviewed and the worst car you've reviewed?

Oh, tough one. Okay. The best car. Well, I'm going to go with a vehicle that is,

I'm going to say anyone could buy without, I'm not going for cars over $100,000,

because obviously I could list a Ferrari and ask, I do review Aston Martins and cool vehicles as well.

I'm going to say like that most, it's probably more expensive than the average bear, but the Genesis

GV80 Coupe was so much fun to drive. And if you haven't driven Genesis, it's Hyundai's luxury line.

The full lineup to me is really showcasing the Germans who always had like the leader of the

pack. If you wanted to buy in a luxury car, you would go, you'd go to BMW, Mercedes-Benz, or Audi.

But their cars have gotten so complicated, even for the consumer, just driving it, just looking at

the screens and multiple screens and a screen in front of the passenger, all these distractions,

that I try to find something that I would buy. And if you told me I had to buy a car today,

it wasn't going to be over $100,000. It's going to be a nice luxury car. I'd buy the GV80 Coupe

in a second. It's just a great car. If you said, no, I want something more truck-like,

I have one of these. My husband drives it actually every day as a Bronco Raptor.

Too much fun, especially in a Buffalo winter. Oh, I bet. I bet it's great up there. Now,

the Flared Fenders don't bother them. They're over. No, no, he makes a statement. When I come

roaring up the street in that, and then of course I also work for the Weather Channel and Fox Weather.

So if you're ever watching and you see me or hear my voice, I've been their automotive expert for,

oh gosh, like 20 years and Fox Weather since it's first started. And there are times like Jim

Cantori who works for the Weather Channel will be in Buffalo because the weather's bad. And you

know if the weather channel's in your hometown, the weather's not good. You don't want to be there.

No. And he's like, hey, can you make it down? I'm like, sure. He's like, yeah, what are you

driving? I said, well, you'll see. I come roaring into the Bronco Raptor and he's like, I want one

of those. Yeah, they're pretty badass. Yeah, they're fun. Are they doing those with the heritage

colors now? Do you know offhand? I think they're doing the regular Broncos, not the Raptors.

My Raptor is red, but there are really no difference between the 22, which is what mine is,

and a brand new one other than a $20,000 price increase. And I know everything costs more,

but I'll just keep my vehicle. I'm happy with that. But no, they don't offer it that way. Also,

another fun vehicle, a little more expensive, but fun somewhere around that $120,000 range is

the Raptor R F-150. Too much fun. If they haven't driven one, go drive one. It's the GT500 engine

in an F-150. And it's a blast. It's a blast. It launches. It's too much fun. Wow. Okay. So you

gave us a lot of great cars. Give us one or two really crappy cars. Oh, that's tough. You're gonna

make me throw somebody under the bus. Any of the plug-in hybrid Jeeps thought they were great

vehicles. They are not selling them anymore. There's a complete stop sale on them. So if you own

a four by E, it's called. They had a lot of problems with potential fires, all kinds of

software issues. And after all of that, and the cars look good and they seem to run okay,

they're pulling the plug on the full lineup of all four by E's. So I'm sorry if you have one,

but I think there's going to be a recall on that. I'm throwing me under the bus on the tough ones

that I don't like. Every once in a while, I get a car and I'm like, I would not own this thing and

I literally park it. It's going to be tough. I'm not an electric car fan. I've driven them all.

I think the problem is because I live in cold weather, which is a whole other part of the

country, plugging it in and waiting for it to charge. I'm impatient. I stand in front of the

microwave going, let's go. Let's go. I want to eat this, whatever it is. So we've all done that. I

mean, you and I are from the generation where you boiled water and you just went and did something

came back and the water was boiled. Now we have the microwave and everyone's impatient. We're all

used to the Instagram, TikTok, just give it to me in a nutshell. So I think that there's a lot of

failures in that. And the F-150 Lightning was a failure. And some of the brands we were not

told the truth is journalists. They said, all these electric cars are the same. They all charge

really quick in this and that. And some do and some don't. And the results has been customers who

are very frustrated. They go to plug in their vehicles. They wait. They abandon their vehicles.

Personally, I wouldn't own a Tesla. I think that Elon Musk is a genius,

but I would never own a Tesla. That is a hard pass for me.

Yeah. Well, you mentioned throwing cars, brands under the bus. Well, you did a great job. So

thank you for playing back. Okay. I have a consumer complaint. Maybe you can tell me,

maybe you could give us some insight on it. This is more around the interfaces. Every time I hear

of a lot of complaints, I heard Tesla wasn't part of the JD powers because they want to let

it be tested in 50 states, only 35 states. If you extrapolate that across all 50 states,

it's actually very low, but a lot of that has to do with possibly the interface of all the

software technology. In my rental cars, if you can answer this, I'd be so thrilled. In my rental

cars, I like Apple CarPlay. I'm not in love with it, but it's what I use. Right at the time it doesn't

work. Is that Apple CarPlay's fault or is that the manufacturer's fault? Or is it a little bit of both?

Software. That's all software. I am an Apple user as well. I prefer Apple CarPlay.

I personally, I find it very frustrating that a lot of the brands are not putting in navigation.

At $45,000, $50,000 cars, you better have navigation. And what do I have in the garage now? I have a

Mazda CX90, but every week we get different cars to review. Last week was a Lexus TX 350 entry level

TX beautiful car, road nice at everything I wanted. I hit the navigation button and there's nothing.

It's like, you have to subscribe. Don't nickel and dime customers. Huge mistake. But Apple CarPlay

should work. If it doesn't, it usually has to be hardware plugged in first. Once you hardware,

you know, you carry your cable, your regular cable and plug it in. When you do, you can connect.

And then it should work Bluetooth after that. Some brands, especially General Motors,

they want you plugging it in. And the reason for that is they want you to use that Alexa

Google interface, which is Android. So the weird thing is that there is more Apple phones out there

than there are Android phones. But this is sort of the brands pushing back as well. They don't want

to pay Apple and Android for the usage of their software. So they're trying to eliminate it.

But anybody who's tried to do that has gotten a lot of pushback is just like removing AM radio,

which Ford decided to try and announce it. We called it out on my Car Coach Reports News channel.

And then they bailed and said, no, no, no, we're going to put the software

downloaded. It'll be back in your car. So it's just a software. They don't want free radio,

which is AM and FM, because they want you to pay for their services.

Yeah, that really annoys me as well. Okay, so you did answer my question. So thank you so much

for that. I'm like, if I can take a call through the radio, why can't it play music? You know,

I'm like, it's both audio and it's recognizing it. So all right, I got to calm down a little bit

on that. All right, tell us a little bit about your Concord judging piece, right? And if you

would close on a fun little Cobra story. Okay, I can do that. I've been judging cars for years.

I used to run local car shows like many people did. And I got an opportunity to judge at the

Amelia, which was a huge honor. That's run by Hagerty. And I'll be judging again this year.

And then this year was past year 2025 was my first opportunity to judge at Pebble Beach.

I was very excited because that was like, that's like, to me, the, you know, the top, the cream of

the cream, the top of the cream, the, the, the cherry on top, shall I say, but I've judged it

so many different shows. And I think it's different because I'm different. I'm outspoken.

People know me in the industry. I was the president of North American Car and Truck of the Year.

I elevated the brand, changed the award. We did so much under my four year term.

And so the, maybe that's cause I'm just different, which I like, but I do love judging and my kids

judge, my husband judges when he's not showing. And, and so it's sort of become a family thing. My

son wants to do the same thing I am. So speaking of my son, who is Paul fixed the third. He's

around and about and he's one of my editors for my channel. When I was pregnant with him many

years ago, 1993, that Labor Day weekend, I was racing a Cobra CSX 2051. It's a 51st car built

in the car. We picked up from a guy that passed away. His son didn't want the car. We picked it up

like way under $100,000 at the time. It was like, I never thought we could afford a Cobra,

but this thing needed a full restoration. We restored it to look like the Sebring winning car.

And my husband said, do you want to drive it? I'll just drive the Shelby that he was racing in

SVRA. And I said, sure. So I was pregnant, but I didn't tell anyone because the general

competition rules called GC ours, there was never any statement that said you could and cannot race

at what point in your pregnancy. And I figured, I, I know, I know what I'm capable of and racing

since 1980, don't do the math. And it's, I'm old enough to do anything literally. And I thought,

you know, I raised my pregnant with my daughter Shelby. And that was in 92. And then in September

was my last race. No, I think I raced right till October and she was born in March. But my son

was born December 11. This is the first weekend in September. So do the math. I was nine months

pregnant, maybe a little more. And I didn't show, but I had an older driving suit and I just zipped

over it and everyone in the class knew this is vintage cars. This is not NASCAR. We're not

hitting cars are too expensive. Everyone in the class knew. And I said, if you got a problem with

it, let me pass or pass me wide, whatever works. And they all knew it. They all know I'm a little

crazy. So they go, okay, fine. So I raced at Lime Rock. And at the time ESPN had just started

another channel called the deuce, which was ESPN two, and they were covering vintage races and

whatever they could use to fill the airtime. So they came by into the school, women racing a

Cobra and I said, I'm pregnant. Boom, that got me on air like no problem. They interviewed me and

I raced the car pregnant. Tons of footage. I covered it. I still haven't done VHS tape to

how long ago that was. And we ended up selling the car two years later because we were expanding

our business classic tube. We make prevent tubing products for automotive applications

and industrial. And so we had to sell the car. Never saw the car again. We were at Goodwood.

We saw the car racing about three years ago. But then we some guy had he had changed the paint

and made it look different and whatever. So here I am at Pebble Beach. First year judging

my classes were 27 Cobras and I had excellent co judges with me. They really knew their stuff.

They were pros. So you were so when you judge, you're so locked into the car that you're judging.

You're not talking to people around you. You talk to the owner. I mean, it's really an in-depth dive

because you have to give that person who brought this car away to Pebble Beach the respect and

the attention that they deserve. So my son's out there watching me and he's on the phone.

I'm thinking, who's he on the phone with? So we're done judging and we are done calculating

who the winner is. And we're on our way back and he says, I got to show you a car. He says,

is this the car you raced when you were pregnant with me? And sure enough, it was.

So it was cool to see here we are 32 years later. He got to see the car that he didn't remember

because he was little racing. But the best part of the story, and this is, and I have this on

Vin Wickey for the full story, was that my husband was racing prototypes in Europe and there was a

ton of downtime in between because there were other classes that were testing. And here we are

in Germany and we're testing at Red Bull Ring. So it's actually Austria and Tony Ave, who's

been racing Trans Am cars forever, we're just small talking. And I said, well, how long have

you been on the competition board? He says, oh, I've been on the competition board since the

80s. I go, really? He's, he's, you know, he's around my age. And I said, do you remember there

was a girl who was racing a, I don't know, some car and she was pregnant. And he says,

yeah, that was like in the 90s. I said, yeah, yeah, I remember hearing the story. I'm

stringing him. Yeah, yeah, I had him going. I said, I don't know. She was racing some cars.

She was pregnant. And, you know, and I don't know. He goes, I do remember it. I go, why do you

remember that story? He said, because that next Tuesday after Labor Day weekend, we had a mandatory

emergency meeting that we had to put a rule in that you can't race while pregnant. I said, really?

I said, so what's that person's name? He goes, I have no idea. And I said, it's me. I could have

knocked him over with a feather. He's like, no way. I said, that was me. I got pictures to prove it.

It was just a really cool car. It was a, you know, a 63 Cobra. And the car didn't even finish the race

because the fuel pump failed. But that's not unusual for Cobra. They just have their little

glitchy things. But it was kind of neat that full circle, I blew him away years later, and then my

son got to see the car at Pebble Beach. And my husband was supposed to be there, but his mom was

sick. So it was sort of like meant to be is like karma. And I saw that with a C that he got to see

the car years later that he could now appreciate that he couldn't appreciate when he was two.

Did he go for a ride in it again? We could not find the owner. We were hoping we could sit in it,

but you don't ever go sit in anybody's car. That's like a major no-no. The guy was from England.

He was looking to sell the car, but there was no, we call them handlers. There was no handler

there. There was no one there to show it. But we got a picture of us next to it. It was a pretty

cool experience. What color was it? Well, it was, it was white again, like it was when it raced in

the side. It was just one of those cars and you just go, this is so cool. And I was so honored

to like see the car after all these years. There it is right there. Oh, that's so cool.

It was really cool. And so I got to judge that year and see the car that I raced while pregnant.

And I am a part of history and the general competition rules of you cannot race while

pregnant. And now the new rule is when you find out you're pregnant. And I'm like,

so is that an EPT stick? When the doctor tells you blood test? I'm not going to be pregnant again.

I'm done. So yeah, you're done. Yeah, I'm done. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. Okay. That's awesome.

Was there anything else you wanted to cover before I get into something a little different?

Um, no, I just, I love talking cars. If you see me at a car show, stop me to say,

Hey, are you Lauren Fix? And I'll be happy to say hello, talk, answer questions. I love talking

cars. It's my passion. Now, what is your, your main website where people can kind of access

everything we've talked about? You can go to Lauren Fix.com. It's L-A-U-R-E-N-F-I-X.com or

car coach reports. And everything is there on the radio show, all my content. And I'm all over the

place. If you just put my name into Google, you'll be like, Oh, okay, there's a lot to look at.

I keep busy. I love it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm the same way. Yeah. Well, I'm, because you're such a

car expert, you're, you're really skilled at this stuff. I'm bringing back a feature I haven't had

on this podcast in probably 300 episodes. So I'm going to lay it out for you, give you a moment

to think. It's called keep cash or crush. So I'm going to give you three cars and you have to pick

one to keep forever, one to cash in, and then one unfortunately to send to the crusher. Now,

I haven't done this for a long time because people were busting my chops saying, well, you're,

you're crushing a car. I'm like, I'm not crushing a car. My guest is crushing a car.

I'm going to give you three cars, three very different cars. Okay. And they're all approximately

the same dollar amount. Okay. All right. So here we go. The first one I'm going to give you is one

you mentioned earlier is the fried egg headlight Porsche, but it's a GT2, which is really becoming

quite the car to get right now. Let's say that's not pristine. Let's say 15,000 miles. So around

140 grand or so. Okay. The next one I'll give you is a really nicely spec'd out Ferrari 355 Spider.

Those have been getting pretty hot. Now, I might be setting this up to be an easy one. I don't know.

Yeah. And the third one is a 1961 Mercedes Benz 190 SL in concor condition.

Oh, this is tough. I have to crush one of them.

Like some people would go immediately to like a fried egg headlight crush it.

Well, because it's a GT2. So now you've made it valuable. That's the thing. Others would say the

355 Spider because they're difficult to work on, but those have been on quite a run lately

and people are really beginning to appreciate those. But like 308s and 328s suddenly they're

going up in value, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're great cars because you've had,

I own 308s and we've had boxers and all kinds of stuff. But when they make too many of them,

they no longer have value. So it has to be a provenance thing. Like you're talking about the

Mercedes Benz that has provenance and it's in perfect condition. So the worst thing you could

do is crush a car like that. So that wouldn't get crushed because I'm not a Mercedes car person.

I would probably sell that. All right, we got to sell. Although it's a beautiful car,

it needs to have a special home because people do want that. There's a demand for

collector cars like that level. You send it to RM auctions, you get your biggest buck.

Before you tell me your answer, let me throw in a curveball. The 355, I forgot what they call it,

but it's one of the last 100 that had a special package. Oh, great. So now you're going to make it

more collectible. That's a toughie. Tell me why it's a toughie. Because it's a GT2 Porsche

and it is kind of a cool piece, but they made a lot of them and they weren't great cars in that

era. So because you're forcing me to crush one of them, I'm going to crush the Porsche. I can't

believe I'm saying this. Wow. Okay. That's a surprise. And I will keep the Ferrari because,

although they made a lot of them, the key with the Ferrari is to have something like a TDF,

but they made 799 of them. Something that is unique or a Pista or something, a Parte,

or something really unique where there's a limited run and it's noted within the brand

as a limited run. Soon as you go to something, they ate a ton of them, like 308s.

You know, they're just another car. I mean, like Mustangs,

they made a lot and they were there to make money. And so you always want limited production run,

some sort of significance, a special trim level, any of those type of making it very special,

owned by somebody famous, all of that increases the value and you don't get another shot at that.

Original paint is always great. We love cars that original paint, original body panels because

once it's not, it's no longer original. So I hate to say this. I love Porsches and I have

quite a few of them, but I'm going to say that I have to crush the Porsche. Okay. So you're

keeping the Ferrari. I'm going to keep the Ferrari just because I like Ferraris. I like Porsches too,

but what color would you want it in? It wouldn't be yellow. That is the worst color to sell.

I would love like a dark blue. I always say every Ferrari's red. It's a pigment of your

imagination. I wouldn't want silver either. It would have to be something really cool.

You know, that's where you bring in like some of the guys from Curator where they have unique

colors and paint sample colors. Maybe blue would be spectacular. And I judge the Ferrari classes

before they're a lot of fun. It's funny. I almost said it was a yellow one, but I decided not to.

Then I would tell them that may have to get crushed. No, no, it's your color choice. All right.

Well, awesome. Lauren, thank you so much for being on the Click2Car podcast.

Well, thanks for having me. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. And I'm sure I'll see you at one of the

RM auctions in the near future or one of the car shows because you'll probably be at Pebble and

Amelia and Moda and all that good stuff. I'll be sure to find you at Amelia for sure. No problem.

All right. I will look for you.

407: The Car Coach Unfiltered with Lauren Fix

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