Jon Shirley pushed his 1934 Alfa Romeo P3 to 120 miles per hour (193 kilometers per hour), closing to within feet of S. Robson Walton's 1940 Maserati 8CL. Shirley, former president of Microsoft Corp., stayed glued to the more powerful car driven by Walton, the Wal-Mart Stores Inc. chairman, through a quick left before plunging into the heart-thumping right-hand sweep of Turn 8 at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca.
It's moments like that one from 2000, when Shirley finished fourth against faster and newer cars, that call him to the Monterey Classic Car weekend. Every August, the world's richest enthusiasts, billionaires among them, bring their cars to the coastal city 110 miles south of San Francisco for the biggest celebration on the planet of the vintage automobile.
``I haven't missed one Classic Car weekend in the past 25 years,'' said Chip Connor, chief executive officer of William E. Connor & Associates Ltd., a Hong Kong-based apparel exporter.
Connor will bring three cars to this year's rendezvous, which runs Aug. 17 to Aug. 20. One is a factory-built Hot Rod version of a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT SWB Competizione, which he plans to race. Its estimated value: $3.5 million to $4 million.
Ferraris figure prominently among the cars brought to the gathering, along with Alfa Romeos, Maseratis, Duesenbergs, Rolls Royces, Aston Martins, Bugattis and almost every other marque, or brand, built from 1890 to about 1980. During the weekend, multimillion-dollar automobiles can be seen crawling through traffic or parked along the tree-lined streets of Monterey and nearby Carmel-by-the-Sea.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aarVOhYa0I4Y&refer=exclusive
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