Photography by Supercar Driver
Supercar Driver Secret Meet at Silverstone
On Tuesday 19th June 2024 we were lucky enough to attend the SupercarDriver Secret Meet, held for the first time at Silverstone. The Secret Meet is an annual event that is quite possibly the largest gathering of hypercars in the world. In recent years the event has seen an increase in the number of race cars attending and they now have dedicated motorsport track sessions and a separate session reserved for Formula One cars.
The standard was extremely high for the motorsport demonstrations this year. We took two Group C cars along for these motorsport demos, our 1988 Ex-works Le Mans Toyota 88C fresh from a complete rebuild and our 1987 Rothmans 962 also freshly recommissioned. We also took along our Onyx Ore-1B Formula One car, although clearly not a Group C car this still has a strong connection to Group C and our collection!
Other endurance racing highlights of the motorsport track sessions included Porsche 936-001 (the 1977 Le Mans winner), Jaguar XJR12-588 (1988 Championship winner and 1991 Le Mans runner up) and a Michelotto team Ferrari 333SP. There were also a host of GT1 cars on track including a 550 Prodrive, Aston Martin DBR9, Diablo GT1 and Lister Storm GTM.
It was incredible to get the Toyota back onto a racetrack as this is very possibly the first time that it has been on track since it was retired from period competition at the end of the 1989 IMSA season. The car has just finished a two and a half year total rebuild to the highest standards with the experts at Cars International. This session was the very first shakedown following the rebuild and the car did a number of laps with the team making small tweaks throughout the day to ensure that it is poised and ready for any historic racing, track days or demonstrations that may be thrown at it.
Our 1987 Porsche 962 was also a similar story. After a recommission by the 962/956 wizards at Katana ltd, the car hit the track for the first time in recent history. We shared our garage with Zak Brown’s United Autosports team and it was amazing to see the Rothmans Porsche next to Zak’s Silk Cut Jaguar XJR-8. The number 5 Silk cut Jag and number 17 Rothmans Porsche shared some brilliant battles throughout the 1987 season - the two liveries are undoubtably some of the most iconic in motorsport history.
Finally, the Onyx Ore-1B Formula One car. This car raced in the 1990 Formula One World Championship during arguably the most iconic era of the sport, with Senna, Prost, Mansell, Piquet, Berger, Alesi and up to 40 drivers battling for the 26 car final grid positions.
You may be wondering how this connects to Group C racing? At the start of the 1990 season the Onyx was raced by a then 24 year old JJ Lehto who later this year went on to make his Le Mans debut for Italya Sports RLR in our Ex-collection 962-201 (Pinky). Although unheard of today it was quite common for Formula One drivers to take part in endurance race events throughout the same season. It was incredible to be able to replicate this by alternating between the Porsche 962 and the Onyx around Silverstone! Both cars are fantastic in their own ways but it certainly takes some brain recalibration between driving the two…
It is not the first time that the Onyx has returned to Silverstone in recent years but it is always such a special experience to drive the Grand Prix circuit in a Formula One car of this era.