Brown Car Guy Aug 22, 2025

Ferraris, Fumes & Feeling Burnt Out – BCG Therapy with Sy of Drivers Union

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Porsche Cayenne

LIVE

Are we live on OnlyFence as well?

Only if somebody's paying.

Do I have?

I shake my chest, especially these people that are stupid.

Oh, no, you did, did you?

Oh, man.

I'm pregnant.

Welcome everybody to another session, another therapy session, quite frankly, for Brown Car

Guy with Si again of the Drivers Union.

I don't know why he's come back again after the abuse he got last time, but there he is.

This is why I'm in a different location.

All right.

I had the Audi R8 owners club, found out I lived.

Well everybody's unhappy with you, so the Aston Martin guys are unhappy with you, 9-11

guys are unhappy with you, the Audi R8 guys are unhappy with you, who do you want

to upset this time?

Well, they found out where I live and they started buzzing me, driving past my head

buzzing me, but because it's not a supercar, it will be very quiet.

Oh, no, there we go.

And the burns have already started.

So how's it been going?

What have you been up to since last time that we spoke?

Oh, last time, let's see.

Well, Sunday I was at the Ferrari Owners Club concourse.

Right.

I just bought at Goodwood, which I've been a member for about 20 years now.

It was a great event.

I met up with a lot of old friends, lots and lots of Ferraris.

I took loads of photographs.

I uploaded them to the drivers union Flickr account, if anybody wants to have a look.

Is Flickr still a thing?

You know, I still use Flickr because I take hundreds of photographs, thousands sometimes.

Like, for example, the brand's hedge photograph, which I uploaded 599 photographs.

And then, you know, members or owners can download the higher risk versions for free.

Yeah.

Very good for that.

Whether anybody actually goes in and has a look at it, I don't know.

You see, the operative word there being for free, and I don't know if you notice,

but I just put up a few days ago, I put up a video on YouTube about content creation.

And because I was chatting to another friend of mine about content creation

and how the whole system works and how YouTubers survive and do what they do.

And there's this assumption out there.

People tend to think that, you know, YouTubers, just by the dint of being a YouTuber,

that somehow, you know, you're cash rich.

You know, YouTube's just sending you bagfuls of money along with a replac or whatever, you know.

And the reality is it's not.

It's a trickle fee.

And unless people, if people enjoy your content and if people,

because at the end of the day, like you do, you should go out and you carry this heavy camera gear around with you

and you shoot all these cars and all these photos and all these events, you know.

And it's not paid work.

It's free work that you're doing, you know.

And at the end of the day, people can either, I mean, even if people just appreciate you

by, you know, liking and engaging with the content.

Because I say to people, people say to me sometimes,

oh, I love your content, but you haven't been posting for a while.

And I'm like, dude, I post every single day.

The reason that you're not seeing it is because you're not engaging with it.

It's not enough to just let it run on the TV whilst you're YouTubeing

and just let it go on to the next thing.

Because if you do that, then YouTube assumes that you're not really engaging with the content.

You don't necessarily like it.

It's just on in the background.

And it won't necessarily show you content from that creator again.

So, you know, from one end, you can support your favorite creators

by going on Patreon and Kofi and whatever and supporting them or even on YouTube.

But at the very least, hit the like button.

Leave a comment, share.

That's costing you nothing.

But you can't imagine how much that helps content creators.

But again, going back to what you were saying, it's like, yeah,

you create all these beautiful imagery,

which you are an amazing photographer, Si.

God, I'm just blowing hot air up your ass now.

Why not?

But you are a brilliant photographer.

It's possible.

There you go.

And you are a brilliant photographer.

You put out some great imagery.

And, you know, it'd be nice, you know, for people to say, Si.

Brilliant.

Well done.

Thank you.

The problem is, on Flickr, there's no like button as such.

Oh, well, that's true.

Basically, you just wasted the whole 10 minutes I just spent ranting.

It was a complete waste of time.

Well, the thing is, you've got to post all the time.

And I really don't have the time to boost it,

to select the photographs.

As for YouTube, God, you know, because I used to be,

technically, I'm still in my professional cameraman.

And I've got all the equipment.

But I don't want to do it anymore because, you know,

I remember once I was doing, I was filming the Geneva Motor Show

for Amazon.

And, you know, I'm wearing this really big rig with these big cameras

because there, you know, the more equipment you have,

the more impressive you look and the more likely

people are going to talk to you.

And I was lunch break and I took my stuff off.

And I'm looking.

I'm sitting next to this guy in the press room.

And this guy is already editing and uploading the videos.

And I thought, well, what's the point in me doing it?

And the other problem is anybody can do YouTube.

If you've got a mobile phone, you've got a mobile phone.

Yeah.

You can go out, take a video, create a YouTube account,

bang, you're there, you've done it.

Yeah.

I mean, this is true.

This is true.

But, you know, but even then, I mean, you know,

again, it's easy to say that it's that easy.

But actually, it's not always that easy.

It's never that easy.

You know, I mean, nothing is ever that easy.

No, it's hard to get people to watch it.

Yeah.

Now, for example, I did a video many years ago of Nigel Mansel

playing a video game.

Oh, wow.

Right.

Legend.

It was in Docklands.

And I was filming him during the day because he was leading a,

I think it's a rose.

No, Jaguars.

He's leading loads of Jaguars, I think it was.

And he was on a bicycle when it's been done for charity.

So I was filming the whole thing.

And I filmed him playing a video game and I uploaded it.

And I've got about 270,000 views, but I've got 980 pound for it.

There you go.

And I thought, hang on a second.

But I looked at the stats and most of the views are from Japan.

So maybe they get paid more money from Japan.

Yeah, there are some countries that get paid more.

I don't know if Japan was on there,

but certainly like, for example, America,

you tend to get paid more than you would for some other countries.

I know another YouTuber who told me this story.

He does a lot of car videos.

He still does a lot of car videos.

And he did a video of a dog protecting a cat against a fox.

A dog protecting a cat against a fox.

Okay, all right.

He wrapped his video.

And even he said he was just,

you don't need to do the fox properly.

It was just this fox trying to get the cat

and the dog was protecting the cat.

And there was no violence or anything.

We're holding each other.

How much money did he make?

Go on.

£24,000.

Wow.

In that one video.

Yeah.

Right.

We're in the wrong game.

We need to be doing something.

You know, whereas if I did a documentary video

of an interview with somebody,

I'd be lucky to get a couple of files.

I should interview the local foxes.

That's what I should be doing.

That might help.

Animals is where it is.

So now I've said,

no, I'm not going to do any more filming

because it's hard work.

It is very hard work.

And that's the point.

But I mean,

so let's go back to the Goodwood thing

because you were saying,

oh, by the way,

try to send to yourself on the screen a little bit

so that viewers can see you.

You can see your beautiful visage.

I was going for the...

This is my cinematic thing

because you always go all turn aside, you see?

So I'm not used to going in the middle.

That's like...

So if there's any Bollywood fans out there,

the old Bollywood movies,

if you remember the old heroes,

there was one particular hero called Manoj Kumar.

And if you watch any of his movies,

he took that to the extreme

because not only would he be at the side of the screen,

but he would like half cover his face.

So like every scene, he'd be like this, you know,

as if he was thinking or he was hiding, you know,

and just to make him even more mysterious

and charismatic.

This is my good side.

This is your Bollywood actress side, is it?

That's the hero side.

My porn side.

That's the only fan side.

This is my radio side.

But anyway, Ferrari's a good one.

That's right, yeah.

Yeah, if you get a chance.

I don't know if it's going to the public,

but if you have a Ferrari, you can drive him for free.

I've been a member for 20 years, as I said,

and it was great.

It was lots of Ferrari to had a concourse.

The only thing that I was a little bit disappointed with

and I do not blame the Ferrari on his club for this,

because it's happened lots of events.

There was none of the very old special cars.

The very rare cars.

Because they're now owned by collectors.

And the collectors have them hidden away

because they were 20, 30 million pounds.

Even the guys who've got the normal Ferrari,

the three awaits have gone to now 9,500,000 pound.

They sort of keep them in the garage.

I don't want to bring them out.

So there was a lack of those kind of cars.

I think that's really happening everywhere now.

I mean, I think classic cars are wonderful.

I love classic cars and of course,

it's always amazing to be in the presence of

high-end, exotic, rare, exotic.

You had one at the last Festival Italia.

It was a 275 Ferrari that was there.

And it's nice to see stuff like that out and about.

But I always personally, I do find it quite ridiculous

when the values of some of these cars

get into the 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 million.

You know, at that point to me, I mean,

what is the point of that car?

Because that's a car that can never be driven on the road.

At that point, it's just too valuable to be,

to even tarnish its tires with the tarmac, you know?

2005, 2006, 2007.

Around that, that was a golden period,

I think for me, certainly.

Because I would go out on the drive

and we would have an F40 of us.

And at that time, 2005, an F40 was the same price

brand new 430.

140,000 pounds.

So then you've got, you know,

the people with the old 308s

and they were like 20,000 pounds.

Dino's are 24, 25,000.

They would all come along and we'd do it.

But now, you know, F42 million pound,

after you sit on the road.

Dino, you know, a quarter of a million pound plus.

308s are approaching 80,000 pound plus.

But on the other hand though, it's quite funny

because I remember a few years ago,

you're talking about Goodwood.

And I don't normally talk about Goodwood

and I'll come back to why.

But you talk about Goodwood and I remember a few years ago,

somebody crashed a 250 GTO

in one of the historic races.

And you thought, oh my God,

and I spoke to a few people and I'm like,

oh my, what an expensive accident, you know?

And the thing is like somebody,

they put it into perspective for me

because they said, well, yeah,

but you know, that car is probably insured

for 70, 80 million pounds or whatever.

So instead of crashing it, repairing it,

it's miniscule to the value of the car

that it'll easily be covered

and then you've just added more provenance to the car

because now it's that Ferrari that crashed at Goodwood.

So in fact, they don't mind.

They're cheap to repair

because it's based on cheap metal,

dimple engines,

dimple bits you can put together.

Yeah, just fiat parts.

Well, not even fiat parts.

Like our folk parts would play, really.

But you're looking at stuff now,

if you smash, someone did a video,

someone crashed a video,

I think it was a Ferrari FF

or GTC, a GTC.

That's going to be

mega money to fix.

I mean, how much is a GTC now?

It's about 180,000 pounds.

But to fix that, that's written off.

Yeah.

Well, the modern cars are.

I was just reviewing a Polestar.

Polestar 4.

You got one outside?

I've got a Polestar 3 outside at the moment.

Now, this Polestar 3

is so weird because there's a Polestar 3

and there's a Polestar 4.

The 4 actually slots below the 3

although the 4 is faster.

I don't know what they're doing at Polestar, really.

But the pricing.

So the price of this car

starting for the range

is just under 70,000 pounds

for a family friendly

EV SUV.

That's the starting.

The long range dual motor.

The long range dual motor

goes up to 75,000 pounds.

That's what it starts at. 75,900 actually, I should say.

This car,

this test car that they've sent me

hasn't even got all the kit.

No, listen, listen, listen.

Hasn't even got all the kit, right?

It's got Pilot Pack, it's got Plus Pack

and one or two other things, right?

85 and a half

grand.

85 and a half grand

for a family SUV.

When the heck

did normal, regular,

basic Polestar as a Volvo, right?

When did they get so damn expensive?

I mean, it's actually shocking.

Five grand is just the Plus Pack

on the car

which admittedly includes a 1600 W

Bowels and Wilkins stereo system.

But even then, and it doesn't even have

the Performance Pack which is actually

another optional extra.

So, oh my God.

What did you say?

I just saw, because

a buddy of mine was checking it out.

We were looking at, I think it was on

Collecting Cars and it was

a 1990 Porsche 964

backdated

to a 1970s style

target.

Beautifully done, blue with tan leather interior.

Really, really gorgeous car.

And I think that one just went for 75 K.

And you go, right, 75 K for that

or 75 K for a brand

of one of the Volvo.

Yeah, you're going to go for the Porsche

and leave the family at home.

We're getting old.

That's what it is.

You know, we're just, you know,

like I said before, you know,

give it another 10, 20 years

and we'll be like the smokers standing outside

buildings, you know, chugging away.

We'll be like in a gas guzzlers

and people pointing at us and saying,

oh, it's this guy.

Look, polluting everything.

Well, this is it.

I mean, as the guy

with the supercar club, you know, the biggest,

you know, I think we established the biggest,

I think we can get away with saying

the biggest multi-marked supercar club in the UK.

And the fact is they're all

supercars and now supercars

they've been clamped down, we spoke about this

last time, they've been clamped down on London.

They're starting to, I feel

there's this kind of propaganda starting to happen

against supercars, you know,

trying to turn people off supercars.

I mean, how do you and your members feel about that?

I mean, that's just like, do you feel picked upon?

No, I don't feel

picked upon.

That's a

very good question, actually. I'm not sure how to answer that.

I mean,

firstly, everyone

hates driving in central London, you know.

Well, that's a no-no now anyway.

drove in

central London

on, gosh,

it was Wednesday, but I took my cheyenne.

I just didn't want to take the Ferrari in because

I can traffic

and the gearbox is always sticky and stuff like that

on the left-hand box.

I think we are slowly getting there

to becoming persecuted because, you know,

not only because

we are driving petrol cars,

but also because it's a symbol of wealth.

And you also

think, you know, someone's been laid off,

someone's working really hard

and hasn't got money to pay for the bills

and food and the kids have ever seen somebody

drive around in a very expensive car.

Then I think

that

is what's going to happen.

But having said that, Si,

as the point I was just making,

I'm in the 85 grand.

That used to be supercar money not long ago.

So now we're not even talking supercar.

We're talking anything brand new,

big-ish looking with like 20-inch

rims on it, that's already an in-your-face car,

isn't it?

So Chris Ellis, hello.

He says, Aston, he's so happy.

Si's pics are amazing. There you go.

You got Minotaur myth.

Chaz here.

He's waving. Oh, F355

thing that he is.

He has. Ibrahim is saying,

don't forget to like the video, folks.

Thank you, Ibrahim.

That's what I think it is.

Yeah, I think it is a pink 355.

Yeah, so that's him.

And we've got Adam joining us.

Good afternoon, you two handsome fellas.

I like Adam, whoever that is.

I like Adam already.

He's got eye problems.

That didn't last long for the ego, did it?

Ibrahim, okay.

I'll come back to that question in a minute.

Places. Smash that.

Polestar's are geelys. Yeah, Polestar's are geelys.

Or so is Volvo's, because Polestar

was an offshoot of Volvo.

So yeah, but then, so is Lotus.

And so is the London taxi company,

London Electric Vehicle Company.

Ibrahim is asking us,

will either of you be at Hampton Court concourse?

I will be there

all day Friday

and all day Saturday,

because I'll be taking

probably 2,000 photographs

for,

because I do the books.

So I, so we're London,

because London Concourse at Hampton Court Palace

is by this union.

So I, at London Concourse, I took

3,500 photographs.

You know, you just, you just, you know,

you just went over that really quickly.

But just worth emphasizing,

Driver's Union is partners

with two of the most amazing concourse

shows in the Southeast.

That's fantastic. And Brandt's Hatch.

Yeah, and Brandt's Hatch.

Yeah, of course, yeah.

So, so actually,

next weekend, Sunday,

what we're going to do is we're going to take

about 50 British sports cars,

Spoopy cars and classic cars there.

We're going to do the demo runs and everything.

We take up a lot of the area.

So we do free shows with them.

They give us free tickets. They really look after us

and they're really lovely people.

I'm doing a book about that as well

for the photographs I've taken.

But the following Hampton Court Palace

are fantastic events.

So those people who don't know,

because people get confused

and blend in Palace.

Because there's two events.

And they kind of overlap at the same time.

And that's the thing. Well, I will say to everybody,

well, I will say to everybody, being impartial,

not being a partner either, but being impartial,

don't bother with blending in Palace.

Just go to Hampton Court.

That's my view. I've been to both of them

and that's what I think.

I'll take something about blending in Palace.

What are you doing now?

They've introduced a 75-pound ticket.

75 pounds ticket.

Normally it's 350 pounds.

Oh my God.

75 pounds. You can go.

And Wednesday and Thursday is a great event

because it's a concourse event on those days.

How much are the tickets at Hampton Court?

Hampton Court is a lot cheaper.

I'm not sure.

I'm going there because

we're going there as a club.

So on the Friday,

we're taking 30 cars

and we park up inside the event itself.

It's lovely.

We get there early in the morning and spend the whole day.

They're fantastic.

On the Saturday,

I think it's always a better day, the best day

because that's when the Konga cars drive in

in the morning.

Really good to see them all moving about.

And this is key.

I'm just sorry to interrupt you,

but I think that is key.

The Hampton Court is a place

where you do actually see the cars start up and move

because also they also go up to the main podium.

We know the lake in the middle.

You can see them, you can smell them.

It's brilliant.

To be fair, it's the same thing happened at Salon Preve

as well. They do move the cars.

But at Hampton Court,

I think you actually see them driving in from outside.

And you have 70, very, very rare cars.

So we park our cars

in the gardens themselves.

So we have 30 cars.

On the Saturday,

we have

three cars from our club

from our concours,

the top three winners of our concours that you were at,

that you were one of the judges,

they're going to be in a club trophy.

So I'm near taking photographs of them

seeing what they do and how they do

and everything.

And then on a Sunday

we've got 32 cars going.

But I'm not going to be there because it clashes with Silverstone

because it's a big Ferrari event

at Silverstone the same day.

And is Blenheim at the same time as well then,

this year?

No, Blenheim's changed.

This week.

So that was smart.

I don't know why they both clashed at the same time.

Normally they would clash.

I don't know why they did that.

I'm friends with both of them.

I think the official reason is

is because there are

other big concours events

happening on either side.

Also good with revival.

So it's very hard to fit in that kind of time.

So it tends to clash.

This year is the first time in many years

later on separate weekends.

It'll be good to see

how the reaction is and if the crowd

is greater for that reason.

So Ibrahim says he's going to be at Hampton Court on Saturday.

We'll see you there on Saturday.

I'll tell you another reason that I'll be there on Saturday

and not on the Friday.

I normally go on the first day but this year

I'm going on Saturday and I'll tell you why in a minute.

And he says that he

paid 55 pounds

for his

Blenheim Palace Supercars

on Sunday

and the Rustible on Saturday.

He paid 55 pounds for the ticket.

And this is the other problem

is the price of tickets of these things.

I remember a few years ago

I put up a live post from

hello2e30bob

who's watching us on Instagram.

So I put up a live video from the Silverstone Classic

and I said come down guys it's great

you can see all these cards.

And then immediately I had some messages from some of the viewers

and they were like dude it's too expensive

the price of the ticket, price of getting there

price of parking, price of eating

multiply that by a family of two or three

or four or whatever.

And suddenly you're looking at maybe several hundred pounds.

And I guess that we are privileged and honoured

that I always go with press passes

so I get press tickets.

So I never end up paying.

But when you think of it from that point of view

then you realise it is a costly, costly outlay

for a lot of people.

Yeah.

I do get people once

they put a ticket, they put this and that.

We have to understand this

and I understand because I've been organised as well.

The problem is if you want to go to a particular venue

it's going to cost money.

So for example Hampton Court Palace

well you know the organisers of the

Conference of Elements have to pay Hampton Court Palace

to do that.

Then you've got a lot of

support.

You need security, you need people to help

the marshalling.

You've got the admin and it's a lot.

It brings up London Court Palace especially.

I'm surprised they actually even make a profit.

It is very, very expensive.

Yeah.

And costs rise every year.

It is getting more and more expensive

but I'm not going to blame the organisers.

It's the venues.

It's just a rising cost.

And if you have an event that's very, very,

very successful

then obviously the venue is going to turn around

so they must be making lots of money.

Oh, it's great.

So let's up the price.

So in the previous life

in Dubai

we started a very small meet

while I was still at Car Magazine

and we started

cars and burgers type

meet. We started with like 25 cars

at Fat Burgers on Jamera Beach Road

and after car Middle East

we continued them.

We moved to a venue in this near Burj Khalifa

and they grew

and they grew and they grew.

We took up space at Festival City

and one year we had

and I don't know what happened that year

because we booked a certain space

with Festival City

and then the amount of interest we saw

that we were getting on Facebook

because for some reason it started to go viral

across the UAE and we thought,

okay, that's not going to be enough

for the other space. They gave us a space.

I went down there. I counted space.

I went down there personally and counted

potential for 7 to 800 car parking space

and I thought, that'll be fine.

That's okay. We're sorted.

On the day we basically

blocked out the entire area.

There was a traffic jam all around Festival City.

It was the biggest car meet that

Dubai had ever seen till that point.

It was estimated that over 11, 1200 cars

turned up that day.

How much was the entry?

How much was it? It was free.

That event was free because all our events

up to that point had been free

because the reason we had created the events

was just a social gathering.

It was just because we wanted to meet other car people

and we wanted to do that.

So we did that and then this thing just snowballed

and went crazy.

We freaked out because

this is the Middle East. If you mess up,

if anybody has an accident or a kid gets hurt

or something like that, we're in trouble.

So we freaked out. Fortunately, the Dubai police

are beautiful.

This is a big shout out to the Dubai police.

A lot of them are car guys.

A lot of them were actually our friends.

A couple of them were friends.

Even the CID turned up and we thought,

okay, that's it. We're going to get arrested.

But no, they mucked in. They helped.

They were fabulous.

But the dangers are there.

So like you say, the next one that we did after that

is we did it properly.

So we had 30 marshals.

We had security. We had fire and ambulance

marshals. We paid for that. We paid for lighting.

We paid for bathroom facilities

for portable toilets and stuff like that.

So we paid a lot. We then, of course,

had to get sponsors in.

So at the end of the day, what actually happened?

It was moderately successful.

We didn't lose any money. We just kind of

broke even. But it turned into

such a big fath.

It just turned into worse.

It was work.

At the end of it, me and Imtoshan,

my business partner and buddy, we sat down

and said, did we enjoy that?

And we said, no, we didn't. We didn't enjoy that.

We hated it every minute of it.

And the whole idea of the meets was

that we would meet car people and have fun

and just have a laugh. And it wasn't a laugh anymore.

So we stopped. And we literally, that was it.

That was the last one we ever did.

And a victim of their own success, those meets.

But it was good to see that other people carried.

Now, I think there's an organization there

called Flat 12. And they do

fantastic meets in Mums of Park

and places like that.

So it's a great opportunity that we kind of helped kickstart

that sort of phenomenon.

But nonetheless, I completely understand

is that if an event is successful,

the costs go up exponentially.

And then you do get into a position where you go,

okay, well, we have to charge for this.

So I can completely relate to that.

It was this event called

Morton House Supercars

run by

I used to, he's a lord.

I used to call him Lord Veyron.

Because he had...

And he's a really, such a nice...

You know what? No, I hated him

because you know what?

He was young, really handsome

and a lord. And he owned

Wilton Manor House.

Literally like a gazillion acres.

And he was a really nice guy.

He's probably still a really nice guy.

I think he's still got a Veyron.

I think he's got a bigger car collection now.

It's probably got the... What's the one after the Veyron?

It's got Chiron or whatever. It's got one of those.

I think he had a 288.

I don't know.

But he organised a really...

He organised a meet at Wilton House.

We used to go there, a few of us used to go there

and he got bigger and bigger.

Then he introduced a hill climb

and a track day in the morning

before the actual event.

And it was all done for a charity as well.

So he wasn't even making money. It was all done for charity.

And then reached stage where it got bigger and bigger and bigger.

And it was just

too much headache, I think.

I remember talking to one of the organisers

and he said it was just...

It cost us.

It ran away because

you get to a stage where it has to be better than last year.

And what do you do?

It could be bigger.

And then you've got more cars and more marshals.

And it became victim of its own success.

Victim of its own success, exactly.

It was a lovely meet.

There were fantastic cars that were going there.

So similarly to events that aren't happening

because Ibrahim is asking, do either of you know

what the car show is on Olympia?

No, I think that's been canned, isn't it?

It's done, isn't it?

Yeah. Is that the one that used to be at Excel first?

It was at Olympia.

Then it moved to a park just after the COVID days.

And then I think it moved back and forth

for a bit and then it just disappeared.

I think the organiser of that actually moved...

I can't remember his name

but I think he moved to Qatar or something.

Well, the first time they did it at Excel

it was really good because they had an indoor track.

And it was really...

That's right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But what happened was every year it got smaller and smaller.

So the first year was the best one.

In fact, they had...

They had about five or four, whatever,

pools, massive,

and then it just got smaller

and then smaller.

Because then they were relying on people,

on businesses to advertise to come along

and have stands.

And these days people don't want to have stands

and they want to pay for stands.

And that's the trouble.

And then there's only so many sponsors

and exhibitors that you can reach out to.

And then they've all got to look at their budgets

and with everything the way that it is

with diminishing costs and everything,

people go, well, is it worth it?

Is it not worth it?

There's another event that I'm involved with

that I won't mention right now.

But again, the last year that they did it,

they had three great years and then the last year

it just went flat.

And you could see why it went flat

because they got too ambitious too quickly.

Because you've got to be careful.

You've got to pace yourself, pace the momentum.

And you know, I think at some point

if you decide that this is your ceiling

it's okay.

Do you know what I mean? It's not like you say.

The need to be bigger, better, flashier.

Maybe there isn't a need.

Maybe it's like, okay, I have a meet every year

and I get 100 cars, that's enough.

That's fine. I don't need 200 cars.

There you go.

And I'm guilty as the rest

because I do the Tribes Union Board

each one's got to be bigger and bigger.

The last year I did it too big.

Next year I'm going to come down a bit.

So why are you going to go on Saturday

to Hamptonville Palace?

Because I was going to explain that, wasn't I?

Hope you enjoyed this video.

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Thanks so much for watching.

Because they are celebrating

50 years of the Lotus Esprit

and apparently there's going to be a lineup of

I think it was 10 really nice esprits

or special, you know, with provenance

and all that. Esprits are going to be there

at Hampton Court.

So yeah, so I'm going to go.

So normally I go on the first day

but I think I'll go on the Saturday

because the esprits will be on the Saturday

so I want to go see them.

Because you're a big Esprit fan.

I love the Esprit. You can see it.

It's over my shoulder, just there.

People that are watching this rather than listening to it

I'm actually pointing to a shelf behind me

and on top of the shelf are two cars.

On the top of that shelf are three

things that are

mobility things which I probably love

probably more than anything else in the world.

Enterprise.

Well, as you spotted, the other thing

is the Starship Enterprise from Star Trek

and then the third thing up there is the

1968 Fastback Mustang

from Bullet.

So you've got the Bullet Mustang, the Lotus Esprit

and the Starship Enterprise is up there.

So yeah, those things up there

and you've got, who's that you've got?

I just like women.

You just like women, okay, that's fine.

So for those that are watching this.

He's got a poster

of a lady behind him.

For those that cannot see this

visualize a naked lady.

See, this is why you've missed out.

If you weren't watching this live on YouTube

or Instagram, you missed out

because it's just a big picture

of a naked lady right over his left shoulder.

So we're talking about

Lotus Esprit, have you driven

Lotus Esprit?

Yeah, I have. I went

in 1990, very early on in my career

I visited the Lotus Factory

and that's when the Elan had come out.

You know, the modern Elan

had come out.

So I went down there, I was writing an article for

I think it was Arab News, Arab News or something like that.

And I went down there

and I got to drive the Elan

and I got to drive the Esprit.

So this was like the, I think the Peter Stevens era

Esprit there at the Lotus Test Track

at the Boomerang Track that they got

around the back of the factory.

And it was absolutely fantastic.

The memory of that drive is still

like I've driven, as you know, I've driven so many things

I've done so many things but the memory of that

is still burned into my head.

And then years and years and years later

I did a review of a V8 Esprit

in Dubai belonging

to a friend of mine over there.

He moved away, then he came back

then he bought a Jensen Interceptor and a TBR.

But he had a Lotus Esprit V8

and we took that for a drive

and if you watch the video

I can barely get the words out at the beginning of the video

because I'm just, basically I am a kid in a toy shop.

You know, I've just lost it.

I've lost the ability to speak.

I loved the Lotus Esprit, I've always loved it.

You know, Spike loved me

and all the other Bond films following

and I like the Mark III.

So I've driven too.

First when I drove, I couldn't actually drive

because my legs, my thighs

were stuck to the steering wheel

and I couldn't move the steering wheel.

So I don't know what happened there.

Then I drove a V8 Turbo

and I was a bit disappointed.

It didn't feel, I don't know, I just remember

it was about 20 years ago.

So maybe I should drive one again.

But I still would like...

No, I think the problem was that

the problem that they had with the V8

when they first came out

was that the exhaust was too quiet on it.

The noise was too quiet.

The sound didn't felt a lot better.

So I think that was like the standard thing to do on them

is just to change the exhaust.

I think the one in Dubai that I drove

I think that had an aftermarket exhaust on it.

So that was great.

I think the only problem was the air conditioning

wasn't working. So on a hot day in Dubai

you want the air conditioning working.

But other than that, it was absolutely terrific.

Never meet your heroes, but I do love the Esprit.

So I think, yeah, meet your hero in that case.

Because talking about noise and sound

it's something interesting.

Have you ever heard of musical roads?

Yes.

They've just introduced it in Dubai, actually.

They've got it in Hungary.

I saw a video.

I don't know if you can hear it.

There you can hear it.

So it's a car.

It's going on.

So to those people that are...

I don't know if you can...

You can't hear that.

Can you hear it?

Yeah.

Just about.

So for those people who are listening

rather than watching

Si was just showing us a video

these are basically roads

where they have painted

these strips on the motorway

on one side.

So if you put one of your wheels

on that as you're driving along

I guess if you do the right speed

according to the tempo

which I guess would be the highlighted

on the motorway then you basically

end up with music.

That's what you get.

And you know what?

If up mayor can't listen

he'll be thinking that's a great way

to make revenue.

Let's put it down a whole street.

We'll rent it out

so you can have driving down

you have a theme tune of some like

Chanel or whatever.

Well first of all, yeah of course

he listens to the brown car guy

and secondly

we're like that

and secondly

there is nowhere in London

that you could get a car up to a speed

where you would actually be able to get some music

out of the road.

Literally you take the damn Finchley Road

Have you been to Finchley Road?

Is that three lanes on each side?

20 miles per hour limit.

What the heck is that about?

These 20 miles per hour limits have done my head in

Finchley Road

in 1992

I was driving down it

in the 90s and nearly ran over

and killed Liam Gallagher

for more aces.

There would have been a slit in the space time continuum

if you had done that.

Literally I'm driving

and I see him he's back across

and I can see him and I'm like oh that's Liam Gallagher

and I'm missing by about half a foot.

So you're the reason they put the speed limit

on 20 miles per hour.

I was in the 90s.

20 miles per hour you're so busy looking

at the speedometer

you don't know what you're doing

and it's just

as I said I drove down on Wednesday

it's 20 miles per hour here

30 a day but you don't lose track

you don't know what's happening.

It's absolutely crazy there's some roads up near

the South Hall West London area

and literally I mean look

there's Kingsbury High Road just where I'm living

there which it is you go fine

because there's shops and there's people are shopping

and they're crossing and blah blah blah

and that's fine if it's a school that's fine

if it's a hospital it's fine.

I'm driving along West London there's South Hall

there's a tree lined road

it's a tree lined road there's no shops

there's no nothing there shouldn't be anybody there

and the whole thing is set at 20 miles per hour

and the 20 miles per hour on a road like that

you literally feel like you get out and walk faster

than the car you're driving it's absurd.

Yeah I you know what

we're talking about 10 miles per hour remember

at some point it's like where does it end

10 miles per hour

there was some talk I hope it was a joke

but there was some talk but they say

look they say at 30 miles per hour if you hit a pedestrian

you know you could kill them if you're 20 miles per hour

etc etc 10 miles etc

look the reality is if you hit somebody at 20 miles per hour

you'll still kill them the reality is you shouldn't be hitting

anyone because pedestrians should not be

in the road have we all forgotten our green

cost code come on

I think if you want to stop any casualties

at all just

banned cars from the whole of the UK

banned cars from the whole of the UK and nobody goes anywhere

this is the other thing

this is the other thing that people don't realize

is that when car is made public enemy

number one what they seem to

forget is that for the last

130 years or so

the car has advanced

human capacity in every

possible way whether it's commercial

social leisure

emergencies taking people

to education taking people for jobs

taking people in every possible

way the car has served

us brilliantly over the last

more than a century so suddenly

turn it into a public enemy number one

I'm sorry but no stop talking

sense stop talking sense exactly

this is not the right place we talk about

damn right

what am I thinking what

is wrong with me right

but that's bonkers I mean

the reality is you know we got to put these things

into perspective and I think the trouble is

is the complete and total lack of

common sense in the world right now

you know when you look at these things sometimes it's just common

you look at it like I said

I'm not against 20 miles per hour limits

where they make sense but when you're on a road like that

if you look driving 2am down the road in south

with nothing but trees on each side you go

why is that 20 miles per hour

it doesn't make any sense just a little

bit of common sense in so many things

would make the world a better place don't you think

I was at this event

and I bumped into this chap

and we started talking and I said well

what do you do for a living

he works for the

some high position

in the mayor's department

whatever the first thing he said

what about motoring what do you think about motoring

he goes well motoring is actually

at the bottom of their list

it's like you know

was that every journey counts

if you got a car

it doesn't

but this is the thing

every journey counts right

so I don't really drive into central London anymore

and even driving across London

it's not a lot of fun

so was it last weekend or the weekend before

I don't know but my wife wanted to go down to Green Street

which is near you actually

it's on Ilford side

and I said well we're not going to drive

let's just take the tube

so we go down Jubilee line

up to West Ham across to Upton Park

right and so getting there was okay

wasn't too bad on the way back

severe delays

severe delays and every single

train got packed

it got packed to the point at one point

we just had to get off the train

and stand on the platform for 10 minutes

because we were literally suffocating

because there's no air conditioning

the trains are ramped it's hot

all delayed all the trains were like

the time between the trains was over 10 minutes

on each case

and they were still packed at one point

we literally had to get off

because we were just feeling claustrophobic

and it was literally hard to breathe

so we got off the train

the reality is when you put it that way

and you go where every journey counts

but you're not making it any easier

why aren't there air conditioning trains

why can't you make sure that on a busy weekend

when families are out shopping

because they're a delay

yeah I know I'm very really going to train

saying that I did use the Elizabeth line

recently we're from London

to Oxford Street and it took 20 minutes

it's fantastic

but if you're going to go shopping

and I don't want to sound like a stomp like I do it

but if you've got expensive shopping

you don't want to be on a train going to East London

and sometimes you just

oh if you want to be late

I don't know I think the mayor

I can understand what they want to do with the cars

and pollution and safety

but I think they're

literally are cutting off their nose despite their face

yeah

I mean you know

I studied in London

I grew up in London, I studied in central London

I was reminiscing with an old buddy of mine that I met up recently

and at one point we were all in college in central London

and all three of us had cars

and all three of us were driving into London

I guess that's a bit excessive

but back in the 90s you could do that

and after college we'd then drive around just for the heck of it

you know because you could do that

but now none of us contemplate driving into London at all

that's how much has changed

I used to love going to London

you know it's like the old super cars

so for example super cars you know

you see them down Slone Street

Slone Street they've changed it now

it's all different, they've made the road narrower

and it's not as friendly

so all the cars, super cars moved over to Mayfair

I forgot the name of the road

but it's the road there

it's just not fun anyway

I mean I'm supposed to be organising an event

in October

to celebrate my 20th anniversary

the first event, first drive ever did

which was in central London

which was central London

in October 2005, so 20 years

and I thought I'd get loads of Ferraris around

and we'd go for a drive

but now I'm thinking we're going to get stuck in traffic

and then you get hit

with fines for sound

you'll get hate posters on the cars

I mean honestly it's like what is going on

and I'm thinking there's not much point

doing it, maybe we might just meet up

in one of the parks

have a coffee and that's it

but you can't really drive

because even going through traffic lights

three cars go through

and then it's a red light

and then you've got to wait and then

it doesn't work anymore so the old days

are the London runs

they've just died down

and I think it's a deliberate attempt

because it's not just the U-Lays

congestion charging and everything else

but it's actually the infrastructure of the roads themselves

because if you look at the way that they've put in

cycle lanes and ballards

and one way systems

I mean they've done everything possible to

frustate the flow of traffic

so it's not, it's a pollution in London

apparently this is a weird thing

despite the fact that cars have got clean air

despite the fact that we've got U-Lays

and congestion charging

in 2023 stats I think it was

pollution in London actually got worse

because they've deliberately bottled necking all the traffic

they're making it actually worse

they're taking longer to get

so years ago I decided to take a car

into London

I had an electric car so I thought

let me go into London, I used to do a run

from one end of London to the other

because I used to work at a newspaper in west London

and I used to take it to central London to get bromides done

this is back in the day

and then take it over to the printers in east London

so I thought let me retrace that route

the moment I entered London

everything that I used to do

the moment I entered London in 10 minutes I got lost

and the reason I got lost is because they've changed everything

so the shortcuts that you could take aren't there anymore

the rows that you could take have been blocked

or turned into one ways or low traffic neighbourhoods

or they put ballards in them or whatever

so they've done everything possible to then drive you onto the main arteries

and then put you all into the same congestion

same load of traffic

thereby making traffic worse

thereby making pollution worse

and it seems to me that this is just not good city planning

and I was getting a ticket every month at one point

a ticket every month

yeah going through

not supposed to go in cars not allowed at that time

when you get the parking tickets

then you've got

parking in central London now

I was there the other day

it cost me 40 quid to park for like 4 hours

that's crazy

it should be a parking ticket

do you remember in the old days

with the old parking meters

you could put coke can rings in them

not that I did

I never did that

I just

I never did that

and now people use the blue stuff

but I never know

I was actually quite well behaved

it was cheaper then

yeah exactly

go on a Sunday or after 6.30

and it's free parking

but you've still got to pay the U-List

yeah U-List

so it's nothing, it's not free

so we're just getting old

these young kids are used to it now

this is the other thing

when it comes back to

the Polestar and what have you

I mean

I drove them around

I'm like okay it's very expensive

for what it is etc etc

but then when my kids get in the car

they're like wow look at the tech in here

look at the stereo

to them they're like wow this is really cool

so it's a whole

inspirational thing

you failed as a parent

failed as a parent

I have failed as a parent anyway

because my kids don't drive

which is terrible

you failed as a parent

so if you're driving a Polestar

does that make you a Polestar

so I put that in the review

you should do

but you remember the Polestar

was actually the sporting

and the BMG is to Mercedes

or M Sport is to BMW

Polestar was to Volvo

that's what Polestar used to be

because Polestar used to run their racing teams

and the BTCC etc etc

and so they turned it into electric

is that the Mustang

and now they've turned it into electric brand

and the Mustang

there's the Mustang

there's Ford are doing these incredible things

because they got the Mustang Mach-E

which is the electric

and it's actually not a bad car

but it's forgivable because you still get

a V8 Mustang so that's cool

but then they did it with the Capri

and the Capri I think

is universally despised

because you can't take such a

fabled and famous car name

as the Capri and give everybody

a bland electric SUV

and expect people to accept it

but the Mach-E is not a Mustang

a Mustang is a two door

coupe sports car

that's a hideous piece of shit

the Mach-E

I mean I like to have been at the meeting

at Ford HQ

Mustang yeah yeah

yeah it's cool yeah we make it four door

we'll make it big

and square and boxy and that's going to be the Mustang

and now they turned around and said

sorry look at the heritage

what do you mean?

John Wick is not going to drive that

but then they did it again

what about the Capri?

those people who are probably designing

behind there probably don't even have driving licenses

but here's the thing

again if you talk about generational stuff

and you go well

if I was seeing

Capri's been out a while now

it's been out nearly a year I think

if I was seeing loads of Capris on the roads

then I would say okay it's a generational thing

I don't really care about the heritage

they just go okay it's a nice new electric car from Ford

but I haven't seen any

I have not seen a single Capri on the road

the new one

I've not seen a single one

conversely I have seen

other electric cars

you know what I've seen a lot of

is these new Chinese brands

Jaco and Omada

I've actually reviewed them

I can't remember the name

I reviewed them at SMT day a few years ago

I've seen some crazy deals

because I'm seeing a lot of people buying those cars

but I haven't seen a single brand new Capri anywhere on the road

do you know I see a lot of these electric cars

a lot of Chinese ones

these are Chinese

Chinese and

and I see the back of them

I don't know what they are

they don't have any logos on them

I can't tell the difference

in a lot of these cars now

they all sort of morph into one generic piece

and also there's this trend now

knowing for car people like us

and I guess for kids as well

that like to do car sporting

manufacturers are not putting badges on cars anymore

so even if you take the Polestar

you're expected to just know

that that's a three or it's a four

or it's a whatever

there's no number or there's no badging on there

that tells you what it is

yes there's a Polestar badge but that's it

so how are you supposed to know which one it actually is

and with a lot of these modern cars

which like you say

are all harder and harder to discern the difference between them

you know unless they actually

if they just take the badging in the name of it as well

it's like how are you supposed to know what that is

if I paid for the top of the range Polestar

I want to have that badging on there

to tell everybody I had bought the top of the range Polestar

yeah

you know it's like my Cayenne

the previous time they took off the bit at the bottom

you know so

people don't know it's the bottom of the range Cayenne

yeah yeah yeah but that was

that was the badging as in the old days

yeah if you had a 318 and you take that badge off

and just put an M badge somewhere on it instead

you know

I don't want to take the Cayenne badge off

otherwise people will think you said my can

I don't want people to think I've got my can

because it's a bit small

you should drive

the can's a bit smaller I'm on the Cayenne

yeah

I'm a bit of a badge snob as you could probably tell

yeah but you know what

that's the day seeing you though isn't it

that is because of the other day

you need to have a Mercedes you know because you need to show

all the Kandan that we have a Mercedes therefore

we made it you know that's what it's all about

right

you had an S class as well did you

it's horrible worst car

you know the GCSE just happened

now so you know people all the

so my sister was saying how you know

our relation just texted me saying

his son's got X number of

first A's or 9's or 10's

and that's what it is it's a very big

oh look what I've got

we do want to show

but then that's part of it

but this is something I think the manufacturers are missing

a trick on because those cars are just getting

samey and looking the same and sounding

the same one they don't sound like anything anymore

and the badging is not even there

so at one point like how are you

going to be able to discern between the

hierarchy of who's got a really good car

if all the if your local residential

street has just got a line of

anonymous looking Chinese electric EVs

then how do you stand out from the crowd

you know

you know do you think there's a master

plan for people for the manufacturers

that's what they want us to do just to have

just been driving around in boxes

basically and brand it's not the

manufacturers I don't think it's the manufacturers

I think it is governments you know because

manufacturers ultimately see manufacturers

are in a lot of trouble right now

because manufacturers have always relied

on brand and on the

on the ideology of their brand on the heritage

of their brand but right now they're having

to strip away their brand look what Jaguar

is doing Jaguar is having to

completely reinvent his brand you know

and to a point where

a head guy and fire the

sorry they got rid of the

the CEO

the CEO just left

and the design team I think the design team

they're working with or not I don't know but that was big

I mean they've ruined it I mean Jaguar

how can you stop

if you stop making Jaguars what's happening

with the dealers

the my local dealer shut down

yeah because they're not making any Jaguars for one year

so what are you going to sell what are the Jaguar dealers

going to do they're going to come back in a year's time

with a whole range of electric cars

I'll tell you what let's have a conversation about this in a year's time

let's see

I don't think it's going to happen

I you know like somebody said to me

or maybe it was you I can't remember but somebody said

you know which legacy brands do you think are going to die

as soon as and I said well I think Jaguar's on the chopping block

that's for sure

the Lotus remember Danny Bar

yeah

the Geneva Motor Show

three new little concept cars

in one strike you know

three or was it four

was it four definitely there were three

they had loads of models and I remember

we interviewed him at the Geneva Motor Show

and he was like really it's going to be fun

and I was like and I was thinking

I'm behind the camera I'm thinking

you're going to design

create build

everything

and it never did

it was all smoke and mirrors

it was all like show show show

they even came out with a really glossy magazine

that literally I think went for three or four issues

and that was it because they were just putting a load of money

into basically it was a facade

it was just like showy it was like look

look at what we can do there was nothing actually going on

which is ironic really because Lotus is an engineering

you know Lotus is an engineering firm

that's what they do

but these cars were literally just re-bodied

cars and stuff like that that's all they were

they haven't learned a lesson so they've turned around and said

what was it that's press release going out

saying was it a rumor I don't know

but it was all in the media that they're going to stop

production

take it to America

no that was a rumor then they had to come out and deny it

yeah

so I don't know I don't know what's happening with Lotus

I mean they need to build a note that's free

they need to build another that's free it's as simple as that

but also

Lotus was all about

what was it

what was the famous saying reduce weight

and then add lightness that was Colin Chapman's mantra wasn't it

and

they've done the complete opposite

increase weight and add batteries

that's what they've done now

when you go into the Lotus showroom

there's one now just near

Piccadilly

and you go in there and you see the

I don't even remember the names now what are they

there's the Electra

they all begin with E

but there's Electra and not the Amir

Amir is the sports car

not the Avaya but the Saloon one anyway whatever

you go there and they are

they are just not

a Lotus in your head you just look at them

and you go that is not a Lotus

because that is not what Lotus was about

Lotus was never about the kind of cars that they're trying to sell now

and as far as I'm aware

they're struggling to sell them

you know they're struggling to sell them

because I think that

and this is the trouble

it's the same trouble that I have as a YouTuber

if I create videos I have to be mindful

of what my audience is already expecting

from me in order to consume those videos

car companies have to remember the same thing

they have a ready customer base

they have to service that base in order

to meet their expectations

not just decide oh you know what we're going to abandon years

of building lightweight, fun, exciting

visceral sports cars

and go in big bill lumpy EVs instead

because that's what our customers want

because they can get that elsewhere

you know they can get that elsewhere

what they come to you for is sporty, sporty drives

and I think that's what they miss the boat

but is the market still there for sporty cars

I think there will always be a market

there for sporty cars it won't be huge though

it won't be huge but it will always be there

as you know

have you come across a longbow

a what? a longbow

it's an electric sports car

I'll send you a link to it later

I think it's called a longbow

it's an electric looking car

two seater

they're going to try and bring it

and they're 995 kilograms

with electric batteries

there's a company here

maybe it's the same car we're thinking about

but there's a company here that's coming up with a new type of battery

that allows them to do something very similar

quick charging, low weight

it goes back to the conversation we were having before

where

a lot of companies at the moment are converting classic cars

to electric

whilst that's good it's a good idea

especially if it's a car that's being restored

and the engine was dead anyway

so that makes perfect sense

you're trying to future proof the car which is great

but part of me feels

that it might be too early

because battery tech is still evolving

so you convert a classic car to electric

now you're just going to have to convert it again in 5-10 years

because when we get solid state batteries

or other batteries

we need a battery like this that'll charge a car

to be honest

it's the same thing because that's still a lithium-ion battery

but we're looking at things like solid state batteries

and there's other formula batteries

that are coming through the pipeline

which could change things quite dramatically

both in terms of

the range that you'll get out of them

and the charging speeds that you'll get out of them

and they're also looking at stuff like for

bikes and stuff like that

where you just swap the batteries

so you just take them out and put a new one in

so you pull up at a petrol station

and you just go right

out and off you go again

so we're still in early days really

I like the smell of petrol

well maybe that will be available

as a perfume won't it, that will be cologne in the future

that's the way to do it

it's a really tricky one

it's hard to get a handle

on where things are going right now

because the industry

I've said this to somebody the other day

they say I've been following

the car industry for 35 years

and whenever you meet directors

and CEOs and MDs and people like that

they're always sitting there quite smug face

and quite self assured

because in their head they're already thinking

10 years ahead because that's the way product plans work

and the reality is

that when you see them now

when you speak to them now

you see this look in their eyes where they're like

they haven't got a clue

nobody has a clue of what's coming next or where we're going

and I think this will be interesting

you know food for discussion

for future podcasts

I'm sure

where is the industry going

what's happening to it, does anybody really know?

yeah

anyway I hope everybody has enjoyed

our second

well I think I've done

this is probably the third brown car guy therapy session

but the second one was Psy

so thank you once again for joining me today Psy

and thank you all the people that joined us

and watched us

comments, suggestions, whatever

I will of course this was a live stream

but I will of course download this and re upload it

in better quality onto the main channel as well

as a permanent podcast

and hopefully we'll try and do this again next week

lovely

thanks a lot

take care everyone, see you all, bye

it really does

About this episode

A lively discussion with Si from Drivers Union covers a range of topics including the challenges of content creation in the automotive world, the rising costs of car events, and the changing landscape of classic car ownership. They share experiences from recent car shows, including a Ferrari Owners Club event, and debate the future of iconic brands like Lotus and Jaguar. The conversation also touches on the impact of electric vehicles and the frustrations of navigating London's traffic and regulations, all while maintaining a humorous and engaging tone.

Audi R8 Bugatti Veyron Buick Century Ferrari 250 GTO Ferrari 275 GTB Ferrari F355 Ferrari F40 Ferrari FF Ford Capri Ford Mustang Jensen Interceptor Lotus Esprit Peugeot 308 Polestar 3 Polestar 4 Porsche 911 Porsche 914 Porsche Cayenne Proton Preve

Original notes

In this latest BrownCarGuy Therapy Session, I sit down with Sy from Drivers Union for a brutally honest, no-fluff conversation about the state of car culture in 2025 – and why, despite everything, we keep showing up.

We kick things off talking about the burnout of content creation – whether it’s YouTube, Instagram, or photography, the effort-to-reward ratio has never felt more lopsided. If you’re a creator, or just someone trying to keep the passion alive, you’ll relate.

Then we dive into the skyrocketing cost of car events – when did it become £55 just to park up and walk around? Have the best events like Hampton Court Concours and Salon Privé become too elitist for the everyday enthusiast? Is the community slowly being priced out?

We explore the new car price madness – with even average motors now hitting £35-50K, are people finally turning back to cool, characterful classics instead? We get nostalgic for stuff like the Lotus Esprit, and question whether it's too early to be ripping out engines for EV conversions while battery tech is still evolving.

Plus:

🔧 The cost of parking in London

🚗 The generational divide in car enthusiasm

🎥 Creating quality car content in a thankless algorithm

🔥 Why Dubai’s car meet culture (Car Middle East, Motoring Middle East) was so special

🤔 What the future holds for the car scene – and should we rebuild it?

This isn’t just a chat – it’s a therapy session for petrolheads. And if you’ve ever asked yourself why we still bother with all this car stuff in a world that seems to be turning against us… you’re not alone.

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