Victory by Design

This episode contains rare and fascinating film shot by Huschke Von Hanstein and Dr Ferry Porsche as they built up the Porsche company through the 1950s, using motor sport as a means of development and promotion on a world wide scale. Combining this extensive archive film with Alain de Cadenet driving and appraising the milestone competition and production cars spanning Porsche’s history – from “Porsche Number One” through to the recent limited-edition supercar, the Carrera GT – a complete picture of the marque is built up.

Alain de Cadenet, a long-time Ferrari enthusiast and aficionado, drives some of the great sports racers and production sports cars that helped establish the marque's reputation, believing that, rather than the Grand Prix racers, it was the sports cars that truly created the Ferrari mystique among the wider public. This show features those milestone sports cars in the marque's history, some actual Le Mans winners and some among the most valuable collectors' cars anywhere in the world (including the TR60, 250P and 250GTO, 330/P3 and 312PB.)

Alain drives and appraises some of the most important “Masers”, from the racer that helped establish the Maserati name in the 1920s, the Tipo 26, to the successful 8CM of the early thirties. The legendary pre-War 8CTF Grand Prix car, which was to win the Indianapolis 500 two years in a row, to the 250F, which would take Fangio to his fifth World Championship. Not forgetting the legendary Maser sports racers – the 300S, 450S and Birdcage.

Alain de Cadenet, a true authority on Alfas, particularly the pre-WW2 cars of Vittorio Jano and Enzo Ferrari, drives and appraises many of the actual cars that won the great classic races which would help create the Alfa legend that's still with us today. Some of the superb Alfas featured include: the 8C 2300 Zagato, the actual car last raced by Enzo Ferrari as a driver and the actual P3 in which Tazio Nuvolari won the famous 1935 German Grand Prix.

Features cars from Classic Team Lotus which is owned by Clive Chapman, the son of Lotus founder Colin Chapman, and includes world championship cars as driven by Graham Hill, Jochen Rindt, Emerson Fittipaldi and Mario Andretti. Truly groundbreaking original cars are driven by presenter de Cadenet, including the Lotus 49B and the Lotus 72 and 79. The programme also includes Colin Chapman’s very first Lotus and many other of the finest examples that are now housed in the world’s largest Lotus collection at the Barber Vintage Motorsport Museum in Birmingham, Alabama.

America’s sports car is celebrated in Victory by Design with a line up that includes many of the most important versions of the Corvette ever to hit road and track. Filmed in the UK and in the US, with cars from some rare and unique private collections, the programme includes the landmark experimental racers Cerv 1 and Cerv II along with the iconic Grand Sport 001, a De Lorenzo and a Greenwood racer and an original 1954 Blue Flame Six.

Alain De Cadenet drives a mouth watering selection of Ford Muscle cars including an original 1955 Thunderbird, a selection of AC Cobras, Lotus Cortinas, racing Mustangs and Galaxies and of course the iconic Ford GT 40. Uniquely, Alain gets to drive perhaps one of the most valuable historic race cars in the world today – one of only 6 that remain – the Shelby Daytona Coupe, the car that was developed to win the FIA world Sports Car Championship. A sister car, arguably with less race history, was recently purchased for a staggering $13 million.

A Victory by Design special that takes a selection of the most important Grand Prix cars from the beginning of Grand Prix racing up to 1960 and includes famous names such as Bugatti, Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Maserati, Mercedes and Auto Union. De Cadenet drives unique examples as ever, including a 1908 Panhard, a 1914 Mercedes GP, the awesome two engined Alfa Romeo Bi-motore and a world beating 1939 Auto Union Type D. The programme finishes with the Cooper Climax, the car that transformed post war racing when constructor John Cooper put the engine in the rear of the car, a development that ensured Grand Prix racing would never be the same again.

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