Widely loved, sometimes reviled, the automobile is a ubiquitous appliance of modern living. With over a billion on the road around the globe there is literally ‘a car for everyone.’ But for the passionate, car clubs have spawned around everything from the elite Ferrari to the largely forgettable AMC Pacer. The St. Louis area has more than 60 active car clubs that put enthusiasts in touch with a group of like-minded individuals and are also important resources for technical advice, events and vehicle purchases and sales.
Having grown up in a very practical, middle-class family, I spent quite a few afternoons maintaining our cars with my father. My first car, a 1972 Opel GT, was sold to get a car with air conditioning to avoid arriving at clinical rounds with a sweat-soaked shirt during medical school. Twenty years of forgettable utilitarian vehicle ownership followed.
Fast forward and the suppressed motor head reemerged, with a bit of encouragement from friends and neighbors. Not wanting to entirely ignore a good midlife crisis, I looked at sports car ownership, with the goal of participating in ‘D.E.s,’ or high-performance driving events. Fundamentally, this is driving a safety-inspected street car on a closed course (race track) as fast as you can. I started with a short list of candidate vehicles, and after a couple of test drives decided that a Lotus Elise fit my personality best. A very lightweight, high- performance vehicle, the go-cart-like Elise proved to be extremely enjoyable and reliable at the speed limit, and even more fun to push into corners near its one G lateral limit at the track.
Lotus has the distinction of surviving its own eccentricity for more than 50 years, with the leadership of a domineering chief, Colin Chapman, whose design philosophy was self-described as “simplify, then add lightness.” The technical improvements Chapman brought to race car design remain amazing, including aerodynamic innovations such as external wings and ground effects to increase traction for cornering. Lotus was competitive for many years at the top of Formula One racing and won seven constructors’ titles and six drivers’ titles between 1963 and 1978. This innovation spilled onto its street cars—the names of which, for reasons not entirely clear, all start with ‘e.’
On a recent Sunday, the St. Louis Area Lotus Lovers (STALLS: stalls-club.webs.com) had its fall cruise, ending with dinner at the Hawthorne Inn in Labadie. Steve Fehr, STALLS Grand Poobah (aka president), explained that we drive Lotus cars so we can “drive a gocart on the street.” The Elise and Exige are the last production sports cars sold in America with a curb weight near 2,000 pounds. Only a Smart Car weighs less! Jerry and Sue Edens lit up a few intersections with the sweet sound of their Lotus 7 clone roadster, and Nathan Russell and I discussed repairs and modifications to our Lotus Exiges. At this level, car ownership transcends function and even form. As Fehr notes, “It’s not about the cars, it’s about the people.”
By Dr. John Holds
Photo by Dr. John Holds
[John Holds is a physician who specializes in plastic and reconstructive surgery around the eye. His auto hobby remains an active passion with interests in collecting, modifying and racing sports cars.]
