Land Rover Legends Show Gathers Historically Significant Vehicles

As Land Rover celebrates its 70^th anniversary this year, there are several large enthusiast celebrations happening around the world. One of the best and most extensive, however, happened on May 26^th and 27^th in Bicester, England, with one of the most complete gatherings in history of historically significant Land Rovers.

The show was put on by Historic Promotions Ltd, which has held several historic automobile and aviation events in the UK, along with The Dunsfold Collection, which owns one of the world’s largest collections of rare and pre-production Land Rovers. They hold an event that is epic in its own right to display their full collection every other year, in the summer of the odd-numbered years. (The next event should be in 2019.) For this special anniversary show, these groups joined forces with several other collectors, organizations, and clubs, including Jaguar Land Rover themselves.

For the die-hard Land Rover geek, the vehicles shown were almost too much to handle. Some of the absolute highlights were:

• The Range Rover Classic Turbo Diesel “Beaver Bullet,” which broke several diesel endurance records in 1986;
• The 86” Series I “Oxford” from the Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition;
• The 1989 Camel Trophy-winning Defender 110 driven by Bob and Joe Ives, the only British team to ever win the event;
• One of six 1999 Range Rover “Linley” editions, the most expensive Range Rover ever produced at the time;
• The Dunsfold Collection’s replica of the original “Centre Steer” Land Rover prototype from 1947;
• The P38 Range Rover used to direct security during Diana, Princess of Wales’ funeral in 1997;
• Early test mule and pre-production versions of several more modern models, including Freelanders and Range Rover Sports;
• A 1991 Discovery with every option available at the time, in pristine condition with only 41,000 miles;
• A Swedish conversion Series I “Grip Karosse,” with a fully-insulated cab and high-volume heater for the cold Nordic winters;
• The Series I prototype “L03” from the Amsterdam Auto Show in 1948;
• A display by Bowler of their high-powered racing Defenders.

In addition to the many other fascinating vehicles brought by guests and clubs, Land Rover provided a display and demonstration of the current generation of vehicles. All proceeds from the event benefitted the Dunsfold Collection, which has an enormous financial and logistical task preserving such a large and significant collection of Land Rovers.

The program from the event can be seen online here, with photos and descriptions of the star vehicles. The Land Rover Legends show is scheduled to return in 2019, and I’m already checking airfare…and okay, maybe I’m thinking how I could bring my early-production North American Specification 1994 Discovery 1 over, too…