Variety is the spice: Highlights from the 2024 Mecum Monterey Car Week auction

Mecum’s auction during the annual Monterey Car Week saw 11 cars sell for more than $1m, and total sales of $54m.

And the headline sale was a competition car, namely a delectable Ford GT40, which fetched $7,865,000. This superb example was one of the 10 lightweight MkI cars that boasted a lightened aluminum roof, improved ventilated disc brakes, lightened body panels and engine capacity upped from 4.7 to 4.9 liters, thanks to the alloy Gurney-Weslake cylinder heads. The net result was a 1,945lb car with 440hp on tap.

The well-documented résumé of this car revealed it to have raced in Portugal and Angola between 1969 and ’72. Yet despite its competition history and a meticulous restoration, the Cirrus White beauty has retained its original body panels, engine and 5-speed ZF transmission.

Two examples of the Malcolm Oastler-designed Reynard 98I, from an era when every CART Indy car looked lithe and  purposeful, also sold in Monterey, despite both being engineless rolling chassis. One was a Team Green car, as driven by Paul Tracy, which fetched $33,000. The other was an ex-Walker Racing car, decked out in striking Valvoline livery, and as driven by the much-missed Gil de Ferran. It sold for a very reasonable $49,500.

An altogether different open-wheel car that always causes a stir is the Formula 1 Scarab of 1960. This was the first F1 design to emerge from the USA, conceived by Lance Reventlow. Sadly, being a front-engine car, it was outdated from birth, but with its 2.4-liter Offenhauser laid on its side, it was very svelte for its type.

This chassis, GP-2, was driven to 10th by Chuck Daigh in the 1960 U.S. Grand Prix at Riverside, and was also tried by Stirling Moss during practice for the Monaco GP. At Monterey, it sold for $412,500

Bids for a 1983 RAM March 01 F1 car driven by, among others, Eliseo Salazar and Jacques Villeneuve Sr., stalled at $250,000 without meeting the reserve.