Lotus Esprit

It's unbelievable.

And then there's tax-exempt car park with Lotus Esprit.

It's just, yeah.

And you met up with some Bond lumini, didn't you? I did.

It's crazy.

Thanks to Lotus Esprit for one channel membership.

Gifted to PS Vet Gaming.

Thank you so much for doing that, Lotus.

The 3D terrain on there, there's enhanced lighting, shadows on there.

He's still playing in the original Lotus Esprit.

And there was the Elan as well, I remember, in the second game.

And the scenery all looks, I mean, much more high resolution now, but it looks quite faithful.

And we've not really mentioned James Bond, maybe because there's loads of different cars with James Bond.

And classic, but the one that I remember is the white Lotus Esprit from The Spy Who Loved Me in 1977, which was the one that sort of turned into a submarine.

Yes.

Yeah, that was probably the most iconic one, I think, when I think of James Bond vehicles.

Yeah, and we've got Chris Rouse next, friend of the show.

Thunderhawk from the TV series, Mask.

The Lotus Esprit from James Bond, for your eyes only.

The Aston Martin V8 from the Living Daylights.

No.

Not a Duesenberg either, but a Lotus Esprit.

Very good.

Lotus Esprit.

Nicely

done.

This came along right after William Towns had designed the, the, the Aston Martin Lagonda, also designed this.

And you can, if you squint, you don't have to squint too hard, you can see an awful lot of Lotus Esprit in this.

Yes.

Yeah.

And if you look at the sorts of things that are getting restomodded now, especially recently, it's cars from Gen X's childhood.

Um, so what does that mean? That means the S1 Lotus Esprit, you know, from The Spy Who Loved Me, which Encore have taken a, a V8, uh, last of the line Esprit and put a, an S1 type carbon fiber body on it.

It's the Jaguar XJS Super Cat.

You know, it's stuff...

You know, so at what point [laughs] d- like, is, is a car ripe to be restomodded? And I think a lot of it is there is the emotional connection to those cars.

There isn't an emotional connection to an F80 or a W1.

But when people see a, a Lotus Esprit or a Jaguar XJS or a Diablo, it creates a little, "Ooh, isn't that cool?" So yeah, I think, A, it's cooler, B, it has more of an emotional connection, and C, I think, as we've seen with the auction results, um, for example, uh, out in Monterey this year, there is a, a growing tendency, I think, for the wealthy to see cars as assets.

Um, and cars of this sort of very, very elite low-volume level, uh, whether they be, you know, Ferrari specials or whether they be restomods, but to see them as a good place to put your money.