I logged on to the Any Given Reason content management system the other day, and an unexpected little message came up: “Domain registration will expire in 3 days”. Damn, yet another bill at the worst time of the year I mused, as I whipped out the well used Visa in an effort to keep Any Given Reason running for another 12 months.

But then I started looking at it from a slightly different angle – that little message meant that today, December 30 2012, is Any Given Reason’s first birthday. So in true car blog fashion, I think it’s fitting to celebrate this date by taking a little retrospective look back at the year that was 2012.

F40′s; 50mm, ISO400, f1.8, 1/320sec

2012 started in a way that I just knew would be hard to top. Just after new years I went for a quick trip to Melbourne for a concert with my girlfriend. We had a few hours to kill, so I managed to convince her to come with me on a visit to Maranello Motorsport in Richmond. And yup, that’s an F40 GT-E (a further developed version of the F40 LM) and a road F40 in the same showroom.

The workshop; 92mm, ISO800, f7.1, 1/200sec

And yup, that’s a 333SP up the back there. Not pictured: Daytona, 458 Challenge, 360 with Le Mans history and literally countless other Ferrari’s.

Sunrise on the drive to Winton; 18mm, ISO160, f3.5, 1/10sec

The first proper event was our annual interstate trip to the Fiat Nationals, this time to be held at Benalla and the Winton Motor Raceway in Victoria. We convoyed over in the 1978 Fiat X1/9, above, and our 1987 Alfa Romeo Sprint, swapping between the cars the whole way. Our first track day of the year was at Winton in the Alfa, and I found it to be the most magical twisty circuit that’s perfectly suited to our small nimble cars.

Fiat Dino Spider; 50mm, ISO200, f2, 1/2000sec

It was at the nationals that I fell painfully in love with a car for the first of many times in 2012; it was David Judd’s Fiat Dino Spider that did it. Continue reading →