From people and places to some very special cars, we look back over the past 12 months and pick our favourite motoring-related moments
MATT SAUNDERS
I have motorsport don and regular Autocar reader Jonathan Palmer to thank for my motoring highlight of 2023. It was his suggestion to gather together the greatest automotive exponents of ride quality you can currently buy, along with something older, and take a considered view of the state of the art of ride quality.
It took us a couple of days by the time all of the driving, video and photos were done, and the first of those two days might have been the greyest and wettest that springtime in the Brecon Beacons has yet delivered – and yet the occasion was still brilliant. We had everything from a new Rolls-Royce Phantom VIII to a 1960s Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud III involved, as well as a Bentley Flying Spur and a Range Rover. We had input from the back seat courtesy of JP himself (a self-confessed ride-quality obsessive) and from dynamics engineering consultant Steve Randle; we had some really testing Welsh roads at our disposal; and we had a surprise winner: the excellent, and magnificently plush, BMW i7.
As Palmer turned up in his Agusta helicopter, I knew we were in for a special couple of days. Despite the weather, I wasn’t disappointed. Thanks again, JP.
STEVE CROPLEY
Forget cars and journeys: my highlight was a trip to Milton Keynes and Red Bull Racing to spend 90 minutes with Adrian Newey, one of my two most closely held heroes (the other is Jim Clark, the Lotusdriving F1 maestro of the 1960s). Newey is well known as that intense-looking bald bloke on TV who rarely speaks but evidently masterminds everything good about Red Bull F1. I see parallels between Newey and Clark: both have or had a mystical capacity to do their jobs better than the opposition, whatever the opposition chucked at them. Newey talks with conviction about the importance of teamwork but has repeatedly proved his individual brilliance by masterminding winners wherever he has landed, be it March, Williams, McLaren or Red Bull. But do you know the most wonderful thing? Like many of us, Newey was brought up by a garage-obsessed dad who messed with Lotus Elans and Mini Cooper Ss. He simply had the genius to take it further.
MURRAY SCULLION
My first trip to Maranello has to be up there. The brilliant thing about the Emilia-Romagna region is that to non-car enthusiasts it�
