Fast cars in the eighties were perfect

No need to reverse when you can go back in time!

When I’m lucky enough to spot a DeLorean, my imagination runs wild. And I say this knowing full well that the car’s creator, John DeLorean, did not put his best work into that particular vehicle. So what?

All you’d need to remedy the relatively low performance of a Delorean, if you have one in the garage that is, is give your old science teacher a holler and ask him to hook you up with some quantum tubing to circulate your magnetic flux … oh, and some plutonium. Problem solved, your DeLorean should now propel you into other time periods upon hitting the requisite miles per hour.

But that space age DeLorean wasn’t the only car I pined for as a kid. As most mums and dads will recall, the car that stood out above all others in the mid-eighties was the Lamborghini Countach. This Italian masterpiece might have actually been built to travel through time without plutonium – how else can you explain the inclusion of its racing style spoiler? Who devised this thing anyway, the X-Men? It’s a downright marvel of engineering and design that can only be rivaled by the Fender electric guitar or the Air Jordan 5 basketball sneaker.

Go pop on the eighties film Cannonball Run and watch the opening four minutes. The black Countach racing along the open highway, revving and whirring away from the pursuing cops is an absolute thrill for the senses. It literally looks like it’s about to launch into the Californian sky. Had they left the driver to her own devices it just might have. The cops in the movie are said to be in pursuit of the car for two hours because, well, they have zero chance of catching it.

This ‘85 version was the third iteration of the Countach and the man behind its design was Marcello Gandini. It had 455 horsepower and a 5.2 litre, 12 cylinder V-12 engine. To put that into perspective for the non-motorheads, your average car in the suburban driveway has about 180 horsepower and about a 1.8-2 litre engine.

But ultimately this was about the look, at least for us kids. When we saw a Countach cruise down the highway, and I think it happened just once, the aircraft-like nature of its metal body and tubular frame looked completely unreal. The thing was, the car was wide but very low to the ground, meaning as it came toward you, it seemed to be a hovering spacecraft. And the doors scissored up like a UFO’s cockpit too, so if you were lucky enough to ever see a driver emerge, chances were he or she was a robot or maybe an alien. Would that alien creature be hostile or come armed with a weird slimy contagion?

Maybe, the word Countach apparently means just that. But its true use, in Piedmontese slang, is to express amazement. Perfect.

This is an excerpt from Chocolate Crackle Saturdays, my memoir about growing up in the eighties, which can be purchased on Amazon and other major book retailers. - JP