[woodcote]

   

NSR0233SW Porsche 908/3 24h Le Mans 1974 #31 - Escudería Tibidabo. RRP £87.95. Available February 2022.

Due to arrive in the UK this month is the latest livery on NSR's highly-rated Porsche 908/3. Ever since its release in February 2018, the 908/3 has been the fastest of NSR's 'Classic' range of racing slot cars. Just like the real thing, the NSR model is light, nimble and a race winner. NSR have also given us some historically important liveries - from the '70 and '71 works cars, which capably filled in for the mighty 917k on twisty tracks like the Nürburgring and at the Targa Florio, through to the privateer cars of '72 and Escudería Montjuïch's '73 European hillclimb champion. There've been some nice 'fantasy' liveries too - a Sunoco Penske tribute and two Rothmans cars.

       

If I look beyond the rather naff painted-on headlights, I think this latest livery is one of the best on the NSR 908/3. Although the NSR body is very much the non-lighted version, they carried off a suitable compromise with the Escudería Montjuïch '72 Le Mans car by creating what appeared to be foil taped over the headlight lenses - a very common 'look' at an endurance race in the 70s. That fix was certainly good enough for me - and they should have done it with this Escudería Tibidabo car too. However, do try and look beyond those lights...

       

Francisco Torredemer's Escuderia Tibidabo entered the Porsche into the rather depleted 1974 Le Mans 24 hours. A fuel crisis triggered by the previous year's Yom Kippur war had already decimated the motor sport calendar. Nonetheless, this was Le Mans... 81 cars entered, with 49 starting - the most notable absentees being the Autodelta Alfa Romeo squad. The battle for the win would be between Matra and Mirage. The red and white Porsche from Spain was the only 908/3 on the grid - and you see it briefly at around 4m20s in this fantastic 70's film of the event...



Francisco Torredemer was a driver with the Escudería Montjuïch gang - a bunch of young Spanish rich kids who bought and ran exotic machinery to drag Spanish motor sport back onto the European stage. By 1974, their Porsche 908/3 (chassis #013) was extremely long in the tooth. Torredemer bought the car and gave it a final shot at glory. Like Montjuïch, Tibidabo is a hill overlooking Barcelona. Sharing the car with fellow-Spaniard and Montjuïch driver Juan Fernández - plus French-born rally driver Bernard Tramont - Torredemer had to be satisfied with a qualifying time towards the back of the midfield. Then in the race, the #31 908/3 retired after 3 hours with a cooked gearbox. Tramont - who'd come out of retirement for the 24 hours - didn't even get to drive. The team packed up, went home - and that was the last seen of Escudería Tibidabo at an international event...

   

Thanks to NSR for bringing the team back to life - and I am sure there will be long-overdue success on the slot car track.

   

[Alcopa]

NSR - oh dear ....

Well, I for one, cannot get past a $90 slot car with tampo lights --

I mean, when they started this, they knew they would need a nose with lights - just like they knew they needed a tail with fins -- and another with a  wing...  No excuse - -

I've put up with the 1/43 spaceman driver for years - but that's the extent of my patience...

I'll get back to my workshop now.....