It is said there were less than 500 ever made and the owner of this super car mysteriously disappeared 30 years ago – leaving it rusting in a Lake District barn.
This rare 1973 Lamborghini Espada Series 3 made on the iconic production line in Northern Italy, was uncovered last year having clocked up just under 45,000 miles in its 49-year life span – more than three decades of which was spent under storage.
The story is incomplete but what is known is that back in the 1980s a man wanted the eye-catching sports car storing for a few months and paid up to do so – but then never returned to collect it and was never heard of or seen of again, it is said.
It is understood there ever since it has remained stuffed in the back of a traditional Lakeland barn at an undisclosed derelict location “around seven miles from Windermere” alongside a rusting Opel Calibra, which stopped production in 1997, and a Vauxhall Cavalier, which came to the end of the line in 1995.
With the owner of the barn dying last year, the facts of how it came to stay there for so long are thin on the ground. What can be established is that it was first registered in September 1973 and its car tax is somewhat overdue.
The car tax was required as far back as November, 1982.
It was motoring journalist Jonny Smith, of The Late Brake Show, a YouTube Channel, who got the scoop last year having been alerted to its discovery and describing it as “the rarest, most exotic sports car barn find I will ever encounter”.
He told his 360,000 subscribers: “We don’t actually truly know how it got there. What a crazy thing to have sat in the middle of nowhere in the Lake District, seven miles from Lake Windermere.”
The manual, right-hand drive, registration No. TGC 44M, white with blue leather interior, 46,461 registered miles, chassis No. 6857, V5 present.
It requires a full restoration and is expected to fetch between £20,000-£30,000 due to its rarity.
The car is set to go under the hammer at Mitchells upcoming antiques and fine art sale, which runs from March 23 to March 25 in Cockermouth.
