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Greetings from Colorado - New Owner


7veloce

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Greetings to all 7 members. I wanted Catherham for over 20 years. Now, I am a happy cmaper with a 2002 red 1700 Super Sprint, 5-speed, de Dion car. It was by chance, a friend of mine up the street decided he wants to buy a 2008 Roadsport RV from RMSCI and sold his 2002 car to me on Tuesday. Well, that makes two happy campers.

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He is already planning on attending the BBQ tonight and will bring the car if he gets it licensed and insured.

 

Congratulations, hope to see the new car soon.

 

Skip

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Great purchase! There aren't many cars you can buy, enjoy, and then sell for approximately what you paid, years later.

 

You have one of my favorite Se7en color combo's. I like your friend's Roadsport but prefer your colors.

 

Mike

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7V,

 

Good to meet you at Skip's the other night.

 

The picture you sent of Jeff's Lotus Seven SS Twincam at the CSU Moby Gym car park certainty brought back memories. I think that was my first autox, probably about 1978 or '79. I was only dreaming about Sevens in those days. Paying for school relegated me to a well used '69 Mustang. I think I scored 3rd place in mod 1 under the old RMSCC rules.

 

Hope to see you in your new Seven soon. Maybe we can put together a front range Sevens gathering one day. HPR might make a good(fun) meeting place.

 

BTW...There are two other red and alloy Caterhams stalking about Colorado, A Cosworth BD(x) in Boulder and an Xflow in Ft Collins. This is the color combination I often dreamt of having one day. Had to settle for BRG. Oh well, I got to liking it.

 

Cheers,

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Am I the only one that also noticed the mid-60's Marlboro Maroon Corvette with the side pipes in the background?

 

The pair would be a nice set to have in the garage!

 

I noticed it too. :drool: I agree that it'd be a nice stablemate to a Seven but for completely different reasons. Check out this thread on my first drive in a '66 Corvette: http://www.usa7s.com/vb/showthread.php?t=3805&highlight=corvette

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Here is Jeff's Lotus SS Twincam Stage III. A very rare one indeed. He think it is in Japan now.

 

Beautiful car! I think I read there were only 13 original Twincams ever made.

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Jeff kicked some serious butt with that car back in the day, road racing, autocross and drag racing. Set some records with it as well.

 

As an aside, his father, Bobby Ball raced Indy cars back in the front engine roadster days. Jeff found the remains of one of his father's cars a few years back and the son of the original builder restored the car which was featured on a TV documentary on the Monterey Classics a few years ago.

 

Skip

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Jeff Ball's dad Bobby Ball started his racing career racing stockers and midgets in Arizona, and he raced the Indy 500 twice, I believe. He later lost his life in an open-wheel racing accident in Phoenix.

 

You're right, Jeff's 1970 Lotus Seven SS Twin Cam is one of only 13 ever built, and one of only two that made it to the US. In the photo, the giveaways are the drastically-lowered headlamps, the rectangular SS badge on the bonnet, and the nicely-bolstered bench seats. In the rear, you would have seen the rectangular "Britax trailer house lights" that Caterham still uses today, but recessed neatly into the fiberglass rear wing.

 

Road & Track tested Jeff's Lotus T/C SS in the October 1970 issue (check out the tailored hippie shirt that Jeff is wearing as he crouches to enter the car with the hood up!!). After the test appeared in print, the US Customs wrote a letter that was reprinted in R&T, saying in essence, "Don't anybody else try to import a car like the way Mr. Johnson (Ball) did this one!" But they never came to take his car away.

 

I met Jeff a decade and a half later through this very car. He posted a For Sale ad in the R&T classifieds, and the area code for his phone was my old home town of Loveland, Colorado. So on my next visit to my folks' home, I contacted Jeff in Loveland, and he gave me a ride in his SS. The exhaust pipe fell off during our drive, so we let it cool, and i held it outside the passenger side while we drove home.

 

I wish Jeff had been able to keep that car! (Or alternatively, I wish I had been able to buy it from him!). I had no idea at the time that this car was the pinnacle of vintage Seven collecting. I'll never have a chance to make that mistake again.......

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