In October 2007 this car was for sale in the USA. It is understood to be one of the team cars from Sebring, 1961. Although the engine bears an XSP tag I gather from Butch Gilbert that it turned out to be a fairly standard 948 cc motor. This was then up-graded with 998 rods and pistons, nitrided crankshaft, a re-worked 1100 cylinder head and modified camshaft. It has the correct Girling discs and calipers as well as the 8" rear drums. The rear bodywork and bonnet are in glass fibre (as they were originally) and the doors are aluminium. Butch has looked over the car and says it only needs a few minor things doing to it to make it "concours". Its body number is 45823.

It is believed the car may be that driven at Sebring by Briggs Cunningham and owned, for a time, by Jeff Brenner.

November 2010 Update:
My reporter Stateside, Neil Anderson  spotted in a recent issue of Hemmings Sports & Exotic Car magazine that one of the '61 Works Cars (apparently this same car) recently came up for auction at the Mecum-Monterey auction in California. It was unsold at $50,000. An average selling price was said to be $17,500: "The value represented here is based on a regular production Bugeye Sprite, not the factory lightweight pictured here. This was part of Briggs Cunningham's 1961 assault on Sebring, where it finished 8th. According to documents, it was one of 4 that emerged from the experimental shop at Warwick where it was fitted with alloy doors and a fiberglass nose and rear body section. It was "restored to perfection", which is merely opinion when the windshield surround needed replacement, the knock-offs had road rash, the paint on the hood (bonnet) was cracked, the right side number ring was cracked and lifting, and the rest of the exterior trim had tarnished. At least the bolt-in roll bar was present". The car seems to have deteriorated since the photos were taken.

 

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