The August Sunday morning. The 18th fairway. Three hundred of the most important cars on earth.
What it is
The Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance is held every August on the 18th fairway of Pebble Beach Golf Links in Monterey, California. It is the most prestigious classic car show in the world. The event runs from approximately sunrise to mid-afternoon on the Sunday of Monterey Car Week, which is the third weekend of August each year.
Approximately 200 to 250 cars are accepted to compete each year. The cars are selected by an organizing committee that includes Porsche, Ferrari, Mercedes, Bentley, Bugatti, and Pebble Beach Concours alumni. Acceptance is highly competitive. Many cars wait three to five years from initial application to acceptance.
The concours format involves the cars being judged on a 100-point scale across multiple categories. Concours judges examine paint, panel fit, originality, mechanical specification, interior detail, and authenticity to the period. A car competing at Pebble Beach typically has been restored to a higher standard than any everyday road car.
Best of Show
The single highest award at Pebble Beach is Best of Show. It is awarded to one car each year out of the entire field. The decision is made by a panel of senior judges working through the morning, with the final result announced from the show stand around 2 pm.
Winning Best of Show fundamentally changes a car's value. The marque whose car wins Best of Show benefits as well. The press coverage, particularly from collector and auction publications, drives values across that marque's similar cars.
The Porsche presence
Porsche has won Best of Show at Pebble Beach twice. The first was 1965 with a 1936 Type 64 berlinetta, a pre-911 racing prototype. The second was 2018 with a 1958 904 GTS, a mid-engine factory race car.
Porsche regularly fields several cars in the concours each year. The Porsche class typically attracts 6 to 12 entries, with the marque-specific judging happening in the morning hours. Air-cooled 911s are sometimes included in the German Sports Cars class, sometimes in their own dedicated 911 sub-class when sufficient entries are accepted.
Recent Porsche classes have included:
- 2019: 50 years of the 917 (special class featuring multiple 917 variants)
- 2021: 70 years of Porsche at Pebble Beach
- 2023: Special 60-year 911 celebration with 18 chassis from across the production run
The auctions surrounding it
Monterey Car Week, of which the Pebble Beach Concours is the centerpiece, hosts five major auctions in the same five-day period. Gooding & Company, RM Sotheby's, Bonhams, Mecum, and Broad Arrow each run multi-day auctions. The combined sales total for the week typically exceeds $400 million.
Important air-cooled Porsches sell during Monterey Week with regularity. Recent record sales at Monterey auctions include:
- 2018: 1995 Porsche 911 GT2 Turbo — $4.4 million
- 2019: 1957 Porsche 550A Spyder — $5.17 million
- 2020: 1973 Porsche 911 Carrera 2.7 RS — $2.42 million
- 2022: 1957 Porsche 356A Carrera Coupe — $1.6 million
The trend at Monterey is that prices for top-tier collector cars at the Pebble Beach auctions tend to set the reference points for similar cars sold privately or at other auctions over the following twelve months. A high sale at Monterey often catalyzes a market move in that specific model.
The other events of Monterey Car Week
Pebble Beach Concours is the climax of a five-day program of events:
- Wednesday: Concorso Italiano (Italian cars). The Quail Motorsports Gathering (curated, by-invitation collector cars).
- Thursday: Pebble Beach Tour d'Elegance (the cars from the Sunday concours driven around the Monterey Peninsula).
- Friday: WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca historic racing.
- Saturday: Various auctions running in parallel. Casa Ferrari event.
- Sunday: Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.
For air-cooled Porsche enthusiasts, the most directly relevant event during the week is The Quail, which often features factory-supported Porsche heritage displays alongside collector cars. Rennsport Reunion at Laguna Seca, held every three years, also overlaps with Monterey Car Week in some years.
How a car gets accepted
The acceptance process begins approximately eight months before the August show. Owners submit an application with photographs, restoration history, ownership documentation, and a written statement about the car. The organizing committee evaluates against the year's themed classes. Cars that fit a planned class get serious consideration. Cars outside the planned classes are competing for general slots.
The work to prepare a car for Pebble Beach goes beyond restoration. The car needs to be transported in a covered enclosed trailer, washed and detailed on arrival, and protected from sun, wind, and dust throughout the show day. Preparation budgets for a serious Pebble Beach entry typically run $50,000 to $250,000 on top of the underlying restoration cost.
The reward, beyond the awards themselves, is the increase in the car's value. Cars that win class or sub-class awards at Pebble Beach typically see immediate 20 to 40 percent appreciation in their next sale. Cars that win Best of Show see even larger increases. A win in 2024 might increase a chassis's eventual sale value by $500,000 or more.