The automotive journeys of our fickle writers, interrogated.
“In winter 2021, I texted Engineering Explained’s Jason Fenske about my latest moronic idea. I told him that, seeking fun on a roughly 20 grand budget, I was planning on buying a high-mileage E39 M5. He rightly told me that it sounded like a terrible idea, and offered an alternative: His pristine, yellow-wrapped, 2016 supercharged Mazda MX-5 Miata club. I said yes, but in the end he decided he wasn’t quite ready to let it go. I moved on.
In June 2022, I got the text. Not only was he ready to sell it, but he was willing to honor our pre-market-boom, 2021 price. The timing wasn’t right, but I didn’t care. I sold off my two cars, borrowed a bit of money, and showed up at his house with a check. I’ve put 6000 miles on it since picking it up in late July. It hasn’t given me one reason to regret the purchase. “
-Mack Hogan
“At least I didn’t choose a boring replacement for my Mazda Miata. I loved the last generation FK8 Type R when I drove it, but never cared for how it looked. The new generation, the FL5, fixed that with toned down looks that somehow made it more aggressive, like a squat touring car. Then I drove it. This thing is brilliant, a king of front drive performance with the best gearbox this side of the Miata or a 911 GT3. The seats are great, the interior is top notch, and it’s fun at any speed. It also has the thing the Miata had: it feels special. There is just something so right about it, a sort of moment in time where you know Honda did all it could to make this final combustion-only Type R its best. And even if it’s just an evolution of the FK8, it’s evolved in the right way. It wasn’t easy to get one–I was lucky to get an allocation at all–but it was worth the wait. I’ll be hanging onto it for a long time.
Or I’ll sell it in a few months to get back in a Miata. I guess check back then to find out.”
-Travis Okulski
“At no point in the past two years did I think I was going to buy an E63 AMG. The plan was an E90 M3, but one day I hopped onto Craigslist to get a feel for how expensive late-60s Mercedes 300 SEL 4.5s and 6.3s are (as one does) only to instead find out that a W212-generation E63 AMG is a significantly cheaper proposition than an M3. A few days later, I test drove one and agreed to buy it pending an inspection. When that inspection returned multiple misfires, other alarming codes, and a general warning not to buy that specific car from the specialist mechanic, I moved on to other cars. That lasted all of three more days before I found another one, just a few miles from me. An inspection two days later returned only minor, fixable faults, so I made the move.
The E63 is not a perfect car. It is massive by size, even if the weight is about what you would expect for a circa-2010 mid-sized sedan. The 6.2-liter V-8 drinks fuel at a concerning rate. The knob for selecting transmission modes is broken on my car, so I am currently unable to actually use any of the more aggressive automatic transmission mappings and will need to buy an entire new E63-specific panel to fix the world’s smallest transmission problem. Forget all of that, though. This is an excellent and fairly modern daily driver with an earth-shaking engine at the bottom of its depreciation curve. Paying for more than nine quarts of oil is just part of the experience. When you jab the throttle out of a 90 degree corner, you get it.”
-Fred Smith
“The Miata did present a problem, however. I moved to California to explore the American west. Since landing here, I’ve been driving all over the state with friends and family, doing impromptu Joshua Tree camping trips and mountain climbs and surf expeditions. None of those things are easy or even possible in a Miata. I needed an adventure vehicle.
Like most Americans, though, I can’t afford an overlanding-prepped modern 4Runner or a crew cab pickup truck. I needed the most capable, adventure-ready car I could get on a shoestring budget. And, based on two 500-mile, fully-loaded camping trips, I think I made the right call. My Tahoe is not cosmetically nice nor mechanically perfect, but it cost me $2500 and can haul four people and everything they need for a cross-country adventure without issue.
I don’t know how reliable it’ll be, as I don’t even know how many miles it has on it, but it’s a rust-free Chevy powered by a small block. I can’t imagine it’ll let me down often and, when it does, I can fix it on the side of the road with a beginner tool kit and a couple pieces of gum. More importantly, when you truly don’t care about the condition of the car, adventure planning gets a lot easier and a lot more imaginative. “
-Mack Hogan
“From a racing standpoint, 2022 will be marked as a failure; it was the first calendar year I didn’t complete in a single sanctioned race for more than a decade (I bought a house in 2022, which set my racing funds on fire). Next year will be different though, courtesy of this BMW E30 325i which I picked up to race in the Pacific Northwest’s Pro3 spec series.
The car is wintering deep in the Snoqualmie mountains, at my buddy’s shop, where it’ll have fluids changed, consumables replaced, and a general once-over. We’re looking forward to running a few sprint races next season, plus an enduro, all with an eye to reliability and fun.”
-Kyle Kinard
“After two years at Road & Track, it’s expected that you own an E30. Just part of the job. So in February, shortly after moving to San Diego, I picked up a manual rust-free 325i with an LSD swap. Most everything on it was broken, but the drivetrain felt eager and invincible in the old BMW way. Sure, my neighbors may have once inquired about the abandoned car on the street, but that old jalopy was one of the most consistently rewarding things I’ve ever owned.
I knew in the moment that I shouldn’t let it go. I bought a running, driving, brilliant LSD-equipped manual E30 for four grand in 2022. Sure, passengers raised tetanus concerns and I had to disconnect the battery every time I left it for more than 20 minutes, but the little E30 that could felt so happy to be alive. Every rattly, calamitous drive in it felt like an adventure.
Financially, though, the Miata wouldn’t have been possible without selling it. While a clean E30 is great, a supercharged, nearly new, dynamically perfect sports car at a friends-and-family price felt like a once-in-a-lifetime shot. To this day I don’t know if it was the right decision. The Miata is far better mechanically, far more presentable, faster, sharper, safer, and financially a no-brainer.
But the more I drive, the more I think that brilliant old cars that refuse to die are inherently better than even the best new car. Because while the Miata is unbothered in the new-car fashion, pushing the E30 felt like a challenge. Its odometer had stopped at 234,000 miles, its tachometer rarely worked, and every bit of rubber and leather was disintegrating. So when it charged to its redline anyway, it felt like victory. I miss that feeling. “
-Mack Hogan
“With my S2K gone I needed a car to park in the city every day. I didn’t want to use my M3 since I didn’t want it to rust or get dinged up. So I bought this ’91 318i. It’s a red sedan with a five-speed and a limited-slip diff. Checks all the boxes and starts every time.
This car will also act as my ice racer for the 2023 season (starting in January). Seeing as how it’s wheel-to-wheel, there’s no telling how (or if) the car will come out on the other end of the season. I’m excited to find out, seeing as how I put a bunch of work into making it drive better.”
-Brian Silvestro
“My E36 M3 has surely lived many lives, but I’ve only known it for one. In that life, I turned it from weekend track day car to full entry-level rally car. Then, I slid it into a rock at its first stage rally, took it to a handful of others events from the northeast to Missouri, and even drove it, in full rally-spec sans gravel tires, 12 hours down I-81. In the end, it needed more care than I could lend it, but from what I hear, more rallies are now in its future. It lives on.”
-Aaron Brown
“After a long bout with oil consumption and high revs, the engine in my 309,000-mile S2000 gave up the ghost in December 2021. I took a few weeks to contemplate whether I should rebuild the motor, replace the motor, or K-swap the damn thing before I elected to simply sell it to fund my next project.
I only had the car for about a year, which sucks because it was easily the most fun and best-handling car I’ve ever owned. Still, I think I got the experience I wanted, as I took a few longer trips and did a handful of track days before the engine left the chat. I hope the next owner got it back on the road.”
-Brian Silvestro
“I’ve owned a Miata for 17 of the last 18 years. In 2020, I sold my 1996 model to fund the purchase of a Lotus Esprit, a car I’d dreamt about since I was a small child. I held onto it for a year, sold it when it became apparent the repair bills were going to bankrupt me, then immediately walked into a Mazda dealer and bought a new Miata. The ND, and the 2019 and newer cars in particular, are fantastic, some of the finest on sale today. There are no drive modes, no nannies, nothing superfluous. It’s just a brilliant car with a singular focus on driving enjoyment.
I adore the ND2, but it also came into my life at an odd time. My wife and I welcomed our first child in late 2020, and I took up road cycling earlier that year. Those things may seem like fun facts about me that have nothing to do with the car, but they do. See, the ND cannot transport a small child and cannot take a bike anywhere without some sort of special hitch mount. So anytime I wanted to go somewhere with my bike, or with my son, or with my wife and son, or my dog–I think you get it–I had to take the family Volvo. The Miata just sat. I needed something more practical. That meant I had to pass the Miata on to someone else and buy a car with shudder a back seat.”
-Travis Okulski
“This LX470 was my single worst car purchase in history, financially speaking. Over 12 or 13 cars, I’ve managed not to get creamed up until this point. But when hydraulic suspension fails, you’re in for a world of hurt. Mine had the comedic sensibility to wait until I had listed the LX for sale, only to vomit fluid all over my street and collapse into a 6000-lb lowrider. I lost thousands on it, and I don’t care.
I never expected it to be perfect. I bought it to get out of a bind. I had a 190,000-mile M5, not nearly enough in the bank for the repairs it would inevitably need, and a cross-country move on the horizon. I needed something big that could get me out West. The LX fit the bill, and the owner was down for a trade. I knew it wasn’t the best example, but I pushed it anyway. I crossed national park thresholds a dozen or so times, had some of the best conversations of my life, and did my first real on-my-own camping adventures in that rig. I rock crawled through a gnarly trail in 100-degree heat and, when the CV axle spit out its grease, the LX still got me through the trail and all 200 miles home.
Even when the suspension failed, it made it 45 minutes to the shop. When I realized it was too expensive to repair, it made it 45 minutes home. Pressed for timing and in desperate need of a supercharged Miata, I sold it at a tremendous loss. But it delivered on exactly what I asked of it: It got me to the west coast, got me out into the woods, and always, always got me home safe.”
-Mack Hogan
“This E30 was a proper COVID deal. I couldn’t pass it up. Though I had dreams of going wheel-to-wheel in it at club races and endurance events, I never found the time to give it the life it deserved. Good news is, the car’s new owner seems like they’ll give this E30 just that. Onward.”
-Aaron Brown
“I purchased no cars new or old this year but merely dumped roughly one old Volkswagen’s worth of money into my dilapidated old Volkswagen. The car returned from a summertime road trip to Burlington, Vermont with a good seven of its eight valves still working. With the help of some magic mystery oil, the intake valve on cylinder four briefly revived itself only to then pull the valve guide out of the head, sending valve into piston and several thousand dollars out of my pocket for a top-end rebuild. The Bug rewarded my kindness by almost immediately eating its ignition coil, something I only figured out after replacing the fuel pump and gaskets twice, the fuel filter (soaking my favorite sweatshirt in gasoline), and the distributor cap. I fully expect to dump another few grand into it to have a shop fix the rust bubbling up behind the side windows on this once-clean California car, and maybe get the headliner fixed while it’s under the knife. And maybe rewire the car, too. Or maybe push it off a bridge.”
-Raphael Orlove
“Who knew car dorks loved bicycles too?
The purchase of a stationary training bike during COVID lockdown reignited my long-dormant passion for road biking, and in turn, of bike racing. With the help of 0% APR financing from Giant, I took a swing at the first carbon-framed road bike I’ve owned since 2009. I’m amazed how far carbon-fiber frames have advanced in the intervening years; my old Cervelo P2C felt comfortable as a stockade by comparison.
In addition to E30 spec racing on the calendar for next year, I’ve circled my first competitive bike races since 2007. Ironically—or perhaps not—these bike races will be held at Pacific Raceways, the same track I’ll also be running the BMW wheel-to-wheel.
Cars and bikes? Who knew?”
-Kyle Kinard
“As for bicycles, I finished repairs on a once-abandoned 1986 Fuji Sundance mountain bike with eccentric roller-cam brakes and sold it to a friend of a friend, mercifully clearing some space in my apartment that I quickly filled with an Italian road bike frame of similar vintage. Branded a Monti but built by another framebuilder, I have cobbled it into a rolling, riding winter project.”
-Raphael Orlove
“Before COVID, I was a dedicated Peloton rider, hitting up the gym in our office early nearly every morning to have someone shout nonsensical motivational statements while The Toadies blared behind them. When we went to work from home, I decided to take up cycling, and bought a Specialized Allez Elite. Road cycling ruined the Peloton. I caught the cycling disease, for better or worse.
This year I went all in. I sold the Allez and bought this, a Scott Addict RC. A full carbon frame with disc brakes, carbon components, and Shimano’s wireless Ultegra Di2 groupset. It’s a fast climbing bike for the hills near my house, aero on flats, and it just looks the business. Since I bought it, I’ve upgraded the tires to new Continental GP5000s and added a Wahoo Elemnt Bolt computer on an aero mount. I don’t have a power meter yet, but hopefully will by this spring.
The bike hobby mirrors cars, even if they’re so frequently opposed on the roads. Now, I have two things to think about upgrades and my next modifications. Neither of them are inexpensive. I’ve started playing the lottery a lot more.”
– Travis Okulski
Keyword: Every Car Road & Track's Staff Bought and Sold in 2022