My day with the Jaguar XK Club at Bicester Heritage

I was invited to this press day, hosted by Jaguar XK Club, which took place at Bicester Heritage. I had never yet made it to Bicester Heritage, l yes shocking I know, but life is busy.  For those that do not know Bicester Heritage is home to over 40 best-of-breed automotive specialists. The unique location is the UK’s only hub for historic motoring excellence.

Founded in 2013, Bicester Heritage has gone from a standing start to more than 50 specialist businesses, and growing, with a collective turnover of over £100m, making it the largest player in the industry and set to grow exponentially with a global reach. The unique ecosystem of businesses based at a beautiful 444-acre former WW2 RAF Bomber Training Station acts as a marina-like cluster, introducing a new audience to very special events such as the Scramble, as well as history-preserving careers and world-leading specialists in the automotive industry. Collectively, Bicester Heritage is all about driving the future of the past.

The Jaguar XK Club in association with Porter Press International organised this event and hosted it at the Hagerty Insurance offices on the Bicester Heritage site. The day involved meeting the owners of Jaguar XK classic cars, namely Jaguar XK 120, XK 140 and XK 150. Some complementary drives were given, and I was driven around the Bicester track several times in this beautiful XK 120.  This car, its design, colours and trim were one of, if not my favourite looking cars from the day.  Beautiful.  What do you think?

After lunch there was a talk chaired by Philip Porter and featuring Sarah Keith-Lucas (meteorologist and BBC weather presenter), Guy Lachlan of HCVA and David Richardson of sustainable fuels by Coryton.  The talk was focused on sustainability.  The whole point of the day was to raise the profile of Jaguar XKs, which is certainly did for me, and if you are reading this, then it no doubt raises your awareness too.

After this sustainability talk, we had more track rides, talks with owners, then headed home just before the rain hit the venue, and did the rain hit hard.

I don’t know if you as a reader of this article are an expert in the Jaguar XK range of cars. I certainly was not prior to this wonderful day, but I certainly feel much wiser and better informed now.  Prior to this day I’ve always had a soft spot for the Jaguar XK 120 as I believe it is a work of art and a beautiful looking timeless classic.  Attending the event, I was very interested to compare the Jaguar XK models which featured coupe and roadsters, and in this video (below) we have a timeline from the first Jaguar XK 120 made right through each model made to the final XK 150 S that was made. This was good to look at the differences in design.

After my walk and review/ inspection of all the XK cars presented in the collection of XK cars on show (see above video), I concluded that I certainly prefer the roadsters over the coupes in all model variations.  My favourite car models being the XK 120 followed by the XK 150 with the K 140 coming in third favourite.

First place

This beautiful Jaguar XK 120 with spats covering the rear wheels. How beautiful and cool is this car?

Here are a few of the the other Jaguar XK cars that were my favourites on the day.

There were a few other Jaguar models in attendance, a few C-Types, one D-Type and one E-Type. Here they all are, absolute beauties, and of them all I have to say the C-Type in Silver (below) was pulling my heart the hardest.

The C-Type here (below) was a cool car.

Never restored, family owned for 56 years. Speaking to one of the sons of the original owner he told me it’s a keeper for him and his family and even his kids love it and want to keep in the family.  Apparently, so I was told, when enquiring about the car, its history and value, I was told that a few years back an American car collector got in touch with the son (and now current owner), asking if he wanted to sell, which he rebuffed. This American collector was very persistent and eventually said he would offer him £5 million which was respectfully rejected. I’m not sure how many other people would reject that sort of money/ offer, but when it’s a family heirloom and has so many family memories it would always be hard to let go. A nice story I thought and that’s what many cars have, cool stories.  The older the car, normally the more stories they have.

In conclusion, I did not take a look round the whole of Bicester Heritage as the weather took a turn for the worse near the end of the day. However, I did get a few nice car pictures of other cars that caught my attention on my walk around parts of Bicester Heritage during breaks and lunch. Here they are. What car grabs your attention most?

More posts and videos from this day on our Instagram and YouTube pages, so do take a look and follow and like.  Furthermore, by following us on our social media channels here (Instagram, X/Twitter & Facebook) and our newsletter, you’ll have the very best chance to see when we are running competitions, like this one (see and select below to enter).

Thank you again to The Jaguar K Club, Porter Press International, and Hagerty Insurance. I know there were other companies and people involved on the day and thank you to you all.  I’m now off to go through my goodie bag that I was given on the day which includes two books from Porter Press International which I will be writing a review on in the coming months.  If you cannot wait for those reviews, do remember that you can get a 10% discount on any book from Porter Press by using our discount code (Heaven10).  See below.

The two books I will be reading/ reviewing soon will be: Jaguar XK 120 – The story of 660725 and Jaguar XK 120 – The remarkable history of JWK 651. The latter book is part of the Porter Press International exceptional car series of books which is a great collection of books .

Visit the Porter Press website and grab yourself a wonderful book/s.

See you around.