A well-kept investment
He outbid all his rivals. In the final stage it was just him and one other Czech racing driver, Boris Vaculík, who has competed in the Dakar Rally, among other events. “When we learnt it was just the two of us left, we called each other and told each other what our bidding limits were. Mine was higher, so agreed we wouldn’t keep pushing up the price,” Jiří says with a laugh. Even so, the car cost him 24,000 euros, or around 600,000 Czech crowns. That’s about six times more than it cost in 1993 when it was made. But if we take inflation into account, the price is almost the exact equivalent of the current value.
The original plastic covers hadn’t even been removed from the seats.
Two months later, the Škoda Favorit arrived in a shipping container in Frankfurt, where its new owner collected it. With a tow rope, of course, because a gem like this shouldn’t be worn out by long journeys. And the new owner doesn’t really plan to drive it much, just to keep it in its pristine state for as long as possible.
Having spent thirty years in an underground garage, the car genuinely looks like it just rolled off the production line. It even has the protective plastic covers on the seats; the engine compartment has completely intact paper labels; and the snow-white paint on the wheel arches shows that the Favorit drove the 34 kilometres from showroom to garage on a dry road.
After three decades, the Favorit had run up 37 kilometres.
Even so, there are a few non-original details. Three decades in a south European garage left scratches on the paintwork from other cars manoeuvring next to it. They are especially visible on the door edges that were expertly sculpted by Bertone designers in the 1980s.