(car engine revs)
- [Victor] They say be wary of meeting your heroes.
That's not the case with Countach.
It's about fun, it's about passion,
it's about sports, about exhilaration.
(engine revs)
It's about sensory input, it's the thrill
of learning how to drive it and mastering how it works,
and it talking to you, and you commanding it appropriately
and working as a unit.
Those are things that only analog and older cars give you.
(somber music)
Because these cars beg to be driven and need to be driven,
I will take the kid or kids to school,
and drop them off and then just hit the canyons
and have a nice drive.
And I come back exhilarated, refreshed,
I've forgotten about all the junk I had on my mind before.
It's a better way to start the way
than a $10 cup of coffee, right?
There's nine different variants of a Countach.
The 1988 is one of the final variations.
There's a fuel injected U.S. spec,
and there's the downdraft
four-valve per cylinder carburetted European spec.
(engine revs)
And the one that we drove today
was the carburetted downdraft Countach,
which was the highest, most powered Countach ever made,
at 455, and was the fastest production car at that time.
(engine revs)
The feeling of driving the Countach
can be exhilarating, it can be exhausting.
You have instant throttle response.
There's not even a fraction of a second delay
when you push the throttle and something happens.
First you hear the carbs,
and then you hear the exhaust come out.
All that is a symphony.
Sometimes you smell the gasoline.
It's a sensory feast.
It has world-class handling, but it's all analog.
The steering wheel is talking to you,
and that's why you just drive it to drive it.
And when you drive it and it does what you want it to do,
and all the senses are feeling that, it's a reward,
and then every time you get back into it,
it's fun, and that reward comes back.
(engine revs)
I love to work on them as well.
And in growing up on a ranch, we repaired lots of things.
It was fascinating to learn how engines worked.
And when I started collecting cars,
I was curious how they worked,
and I would repair them myself.
It was almost like a therapeutic thing
to take it apart, figure out how they made it,
and be fascinated with the engineering
that went into sometimes just a little faster.
It was amazing, the engineering that went
into something that simple.
And repairing them is also rewarding,
because you're keeping them on the road,
and somebody else is gonna enjoy that car
if you keep it going.
(power tools whir)
And sometimes I'll pick the kids up after school
in a cool car, and bring them back to the shop
and we'll look at it and discuss
how this works, how that works,
and hey we could clean all the brake dust off the wheels,
'cause that'll damage the paint if we just let it sit there.
And they love to help, and they're excited about it,
and they love to be involved.
But it makes me feel good as a father.
I'm passing on an old car aspect of life on down,
and I hope that they appreciate it, enjoy it,
because imagine how boring the world would be
when everyone just jumps in their autonomous pod
and they just get taken.
But hopefully we'll always be able to get in our old cars
and drive 'em the way they were meant to be.
(engine revs)
The most rewarding part of it is just driving it,
and just go through the gears and try something new with it.
You know, try shifting at this point or that point
to see how it behaves differently.
Then you learn what it likes, what it doesn't like.
And learning how it works, and finding that sweet spot
where everything is harmonious with you and vice-versa.
Just get in it and go.
My name is Victor Holtorf and this is Why I Drive.
(somber music)