The 13th rendition of The Classic Car Show on July 6 drew all the collectable genres of the classic car movement in 2025. Cars ranging from British classics to American muscle and modern day exotica rolled into the Nasrec Expo Centre, a few kilometres south west of the Jo’burg CBD this past Sunday on July 6, 2025, to create a mouth-watering showcase of “petrol-headonism.”
One of the oldest cars on display was a beautifully-restored 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air four-door sedan with perfect dual-tone paintwork and resto-mod touches, such as side-exit exhaust pipes and stand-out classic American custom wheels. At the other end of the spectrum was a 1958 British Wolseley 1500 sedan, also in dual-tone paint, but ultra-conservative and relatively tiny compared to the fins and flash examples of American cars in the 1950s.
American pick-up trucks from that era are highly prized today and relatively easy to restore because they have so few hard-to-source trim items such as cars of the period. A prime example of one of these was the metallic purple 1958 Chevy pick-up, although this particular truck was unusually resplendent in lots of chrome work, such as the grille, bumpers and side-flashes that aren’t often seen on custom pick ups of this era.
From the 1960s was a bright yellow Chevy pick-up and those petrol-heads who have been attending The Classic Car Show since its inception in 2012 will recognize this particular beauty as one of the first rides in The Classic Car Show organizer Paulo Calisto’s collection. Since the classic car bug bit Paulo hard 14 years ago – one of the shows was cancelled during the Covid-19 era – Paulo has gathered together his own carefully-chosen classics – in between organizing one of the most popular cars shows on the Gauteng calendar.
Working back through the years, a subdued-looking 1959 Chevrolet Biscayne was typical of the cars that have been stored in garages in Johannesburg’s southern suburbs since they were first built. The patina that such faded original cars have is irreplaceable, and this particular be-finned Chevy told of years of careful nurturing by its owners during a time period going back almost 70 years!
Fast-forwarding to the 1970s, this was the era of true American Muscle cars, and the cars that showed up a the 2025 Classic Car Show didn’t disappoint. If ever there was a classic American muscle car of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s it was the Dodge Charger 440, and there were a couple of these at Nasrec last Sunday.
The Classic Car Show is not all about cars from a by-gone era, and it was gratifying to see modern collectable classics- and indeed supercars – also turn up at the Nasrec grounds. Every young boy at the show was gaping at the iconic Ferrari 430 roadster from the early 2000s in trademark red, symbolizing an era when the famous Michael Schumacher joined the Ferrari Formula One team. The German driver racked up a series of race victories that wasn’t surpassed until the advent of the Lewis Hamilton steamroller that still hasn’t completely run out of puff.
Hamilton started his career in a McLaren, and talking of that famous racing make, alongside the Ferrari 430, was a pristine white McLaren MP4 12C road car. Between the two of them, these two brands have dominated recent eras in Formula One and even today, but for the genius of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, the 2025 Formula One World championship might well be construed as a McLaren versus Ferrari dog-fight.
Porsche has never entered Formula One as a car constructor, although through Niki Lauda, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna a Porsche engine powered three world champion drivers to victory. But it was at the Le Mans 24 Hour race that Porsche began its dominance in the 1980s, and it was good to see a German Porsche 911 from this era joining its Italian and British brethren at Nasrec on July 6.
An iconic racing car in a local sense in the 1980s was the Toyota RSi and an early example of one of these was seen in the form of the original knife-edge model using the famous 4A-GE 16-valve motor. But The Classic Car Show is also about odd-ball classics, and gracing the Nasrec Grounds this past Sunday were a radically-customised version of the second-generation VW Beetle cabriolet, a 1970s tribute to Herbie the Lovebug, and a Honda Goldwing trike towing what looked like a mini-fold-up caravan!
“It was great to see such a mix of classics once again at Nasrec” commented organiser Paulo Calisto, who organized his first classic car show at a restaurant south of Jo’burg 14 years ago. “I was particularly happy to see that the arrangements we made for the classic car guys to get into Nasrec easily worked like a charm. Next year’s event is going be bumper edition of The Classic Car Show.”
For more information visit www.classiccars.co.za
