Had an early start today to catch one of the highlights of Monterey week today: the Hagerty Dawn Patrol. It's the must ‘tick off’ experience to add to the list of back-to back shows, amazing exotica and heady auction action in glorious Monterey week.
Classic insurance giant (well they are over here in the US) Hagerty sponsors the daybreak gathering for those that can be arsed to get out of bed early and catch the concours entrants as they thread their six, seven (and even eight) figure exotica through the gates and on to the magnificent 18th fairway outside The Lodge at Pebble Beach.
Turn up and you’re rewarded with a large cup of coffee and a doughnut – and a 2011 Hagerty Dawn Patrol-liveried baseball cap for the first 150 to arrive; snaring one of these is almost a right of passage for Monterey week attendees with the sight of people wearing caps almost as much a part of the collector car scene as displaying a trophy wife and sporting a set of piano keyboard teeth...
The dawn patrol kicks off at 5:30, an hour before the first car appears but, man, people are keen: the caps are gone in the first 20 minutes, by when the lawns in front of the Lodge (where the awards are made) are decked out with enough picnic blankets and chairs to rival even the most densely towel-strewn Majorca pool deck at the height of summer.
Clearly everyone wants to be close to the action when the coveted Best of Show and the string of class awards that precede it are handed out this afternoon.
