I have a theory: I believe that the hype surrounding a vintage high
performance vehicles is inversely proportional to its rarity, i.e., the
more scarce the vehicle, the faster it was. Here in NE Ohio, a Tiger or
any other unibody car from England had a rust-out half-life of about
thirty minutes, give or take a few. Not many cars lasted, but the
legends continued on. There were three dealers that sold Rootes products
here back in the day, so many folks at least knew about Tigers. Now, I
get a lot of double-takes, mostly from gray-haired guys (like me) who
hear the rumble and instinctively look up. Usually a nod or a thumbs-up
follows. Of course, the spikey-haired kid in the trash-can exhausted
Prelude could care less...until you smoke him to the next light.
But then you run into "The expert". You know, the guy who knows more
about your car than you do. They surround your car, usually at a
cruise-in or similar venue, and tell all who will listen of the mighty
feats of speed and racing that a Tiger was capable of performing. Yeh
right. With 164 HP and those weenie tires. But never mind that, it was a
Big Block Vette killer, cause he saw it when he was a kid... or heard
about it... or knew someone who thought they heard it. And it goes on
and on. Yawn. Sometimes I think I should paint a big red "S" on the
hood, since I've been told so many times how well Tigers leap tall
buildings with a single dump of the clutch.
But instead I just sit back and listen, enjoying all those tire-kicking
tales.
Bugz
-----Original Message-----
From: tigers-bounces+mark.rense=ge.com@autox.team.net
[mailto:tigers-bounces+mark.rense=ge.com@autox.team.net] On Behalf Of
CoolVT@aol.com
Sent: Friday, November 02, 2007 1:02 PM
To: tigers@autox.team.net
Subject: [Tigers] Any truth to this commotion thing?
I was speaking to a Canadian lady friend today who asked what kind of
old car I had. When I told her, the following was her response.
"I know that down in Watkins there was always some commotion when a
Sunbeam was spotted. As a matter of fact I was just speaking with a
friend of mine from Pittsburgh just this morning. I met at Watkins
about 6 years ago. I mentioned that you had a Sunbeam and the first
thing he asked was if it was a Tiger? "
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