oversquare

canon 700D

“What’s the rarest Ford you can think of and how are there two of them here?” sums up the All Ford Day nicely. I skipped 2024 so I can only assume Bill Bourke’s 428 XW was there, but I was quickly humbled in 2023.

My approach was pretty simple – what is something I think is too rare to see? For 2023 I thought I was safe – a Sierra Cosworth RS500. Something that wasn’t sold in Australia, was bleedingly expensive when new and was so easy to steal that Top Gear had a whole bit about it.

I saw two in 2023.

So 2025 approaches and I need to reset my expectations a bit – what is genuinely unlikely to be there? I picked a target – an FGX with a Holy Grail kit from Premcar fitted. Realistically, FGXs didn’t sell that well and the Holy Grail kit was an expensive add on that is fairly desirable now, on top of a model that is holding it’s value well etc.

The day didn’t start well – I saw the weirdest Ford I’ve ever seen in my life on the drive to Willowbank. A Capri that looked like it was AI generated. It was somehow a Capri, but also an XA hardtop and also an XB. Which, it turns out, was accurate – it had XA bumpers shortened to fit a Capri width, an XB bonnet with the same treatment, XA hardtop quarter panels grafted on the Capri etc. Keeps me up at night.

So that’s a weird one off the list but a bit unpredictable. There were 6 or 7 Dick Johnson Grand Prix XEs, so rare cars come in packs. You’d have to be slightly upset to turn up with a weird, rare turbo six Falcon and not only be met with another half dozen, but to also be upstaged by an even more rare and weird turbo six. A Mick Webb XF SVO, which makes rocking horse shit look fairly common.

Hmm what else is on the list? A Force 6 – check, one of 80 or so. A Force 8 – yep, complete the set. Sierra Cosworths are boring now, so what about an Escort RS Cosworth? Check.

So how’d I go on my Holy Grail hunt? I was feeling reasonably confident, people are so confident of future value most rarely get driven…which is what I said as I rounded the corner and saw not just a Holy Grail, but THE Holy Grail – P001, Premcars first Holy Grail kit fitted and a car that remained owned by Premcar itself until it was sold. It was also the LAST FGX XR8 sold, making it effectively the last best Ford Falcon ever sold (noting that the GT-F is sold by Ford Performance Vehicles, not Ford technically).

As far as rare Ford’s go, that one is a bit hard to top and I’m at a bit of a loss what to look for next year – presumably a geniunely article GT40 will drive past me when I turn the camera off..