A Collection of Car Questions Trivia Quiz

Answer: The 24 Hours of Le Mans

The commonly believed story is that in the early days of the "24 Hours of Le Mans" race, the drivers would start out across the track from their cars. At the starting indication (often, the dropping of the French flag) drivers would run to their cars, start them, and begin racing. By placing the ignition to the left, Porsche enabled their drivers to start the cars with their left hands while putting the transmission in gear with their right, resulting supposedly in a slightly faster start.

In the year 2019, however, Porsche claimed that this common belief is a myth and that the company had merely been trying to save on costs by using less ignition wiring.

Incidentally, the 24 Hours of Le Mans is the oldest endurance race for automobiles in the world, having started in 1923.

Answer: Ford

The Gran Torino has frequently been seen in popular culture. In addition to Clint Eastwood's 2008 movie, "Gran Torino," the car appeared in "Fast and Furious" in 2009, and later model year Gran Torinos were featured in both the TV series and the movie "Starsky and Hutch."

Answer: 1961 Ferrari GT California

As you may remember, the Ferrari was the pride and joy of Ferris's friend's father. The high (or low) point of the car's role came when it plunged into a chasm behind its garage. The close up shots of the Ferrari were of an actual GT California, but otherwise replica cars were used in the filming. Very few of the actual Ferrari 250 GT Californias were built and they sell for millions of dollars today.

Answer: Nurburgring

The Nurburgring is one of the earliest purpose-built race courses in the world, with a colorful, and sometimes dark, history. Its unofficial nickname is the Green Hell. It's a long and difficult track, with elevation changes, dangerous corners, and few safe run-off areas, and in its earlier days it had a deserved reputation as a very dangerous track. Famed Formula 1 driver Jackie Stewart once said he got great satisfaction from winning at the Nurburgring but he always wondered if he would see his home again when he left for a race there.

It's the site of the famed fiery crash by 3-time Formula 1 champion Nicki Lauda in 1976, after which Formula 1 left the Nurburgring. The track was rebuilt in the 1980s with a still-grueling length and difficulty but far safer course. Formula 1 returned at various times since then, most recently in 2020, though the signature race currently is the Nurburgring 24 Hours (a 24 hour touring car and GT endurance race, held annually at the track). Most people probably have heard of the track because many automobile (and motorcycle) manufacturers bring cars there to set lap times, which they then use in marketing materials (if they do well). Porsche, Mercedes, Lamborghini, and Ferrari frequently vie for bragging rights.

Answer: Bugatti Chiron

The 1,479 horsepower, W16 motor, Bugatti Chiron debuted in 2016 and so could not have been in the Bond novels, which were predominantly from the 1950s. The Citroen was in Casino Royale, being chased by Bond in the Mark VI Bentley. The Bentley was also in Moonraker. The Aston Martin DB III was in Goldfinger, though in the movie version it became a DB5.

Answer: Ford Mustang from "Gone in 60 Seconds"

In the 2000 movie "Gone in 60 Seconds," Eleanor was one of the fifty cars that needed to be stolen by Nicolas Cage's character in order to save his brother from a gangster he had become involved with. Eleanor was the nickname of a 1967 Shelby GT500, a special model of the Ford Mustang. In 2013, one of the several Mustangs used as Eleanor in the film sold for $1,000,000 at auction. There was also a 1974 film of "Gone in 60 Seconds" with an Eleanor Mustang, but portrayed as a 1973 GT500.

Answer: First names of founders of car companies

Ransom Olds was an early inventor of the steam powered car. He built his first car powered by gasoline in 1896. The following year he founded his own automobile company, the Olds Motor Vehicle Company. As you can imagine, he developed and sold the Oldsmobile and also the REO automobiles. Ettore Bugatti was the founder in 1909 of Automobiles E. Bugatti, a French company manufacturing, obviously, automobiles.

His cars were some of the most beautiful, fastest, and most advanced of the era. In 1998 the Volkswagen Group bought the rights to the Bugatti company name and has since produced some of the world fastest cars, such as the Bugatti Veyron and the Bugatti Chiron. "Enzo" is of course Enzo Ferrari, who founded the iconic Italian sports car company.

He was a highly successful race car driver, ran Alfa Romeo's racing division. He then founded Ferrari S.p.A. in 1939 and began producing cars branded as Ferrari in 1947 in Maranello. His cars have had tremendous racing success, and his road cars are classic high performance legends. Ferruccio Lamborghini first founded Lamborghini Trattori, making tractors and other agricultural equipment, in Italy in 1948.

Then in 1963 he started Automobili Lamborghini, which produced high performance sports cars in Italy. Lamborghini's 1960s Miura was the car that essentially established mid-engine placement as the desired setup for very high performance cars. His cars were known for dramatic styling and extremely high performance. Lamborghini as a company was sold in the 1970s and eventually the Volkswagen Group took ownership and continues as owner today, as of 2021.

Answer: 1965 Sunbeam Tiger

TV spy Maxwell Smart, played by Don Adams, drove a 1965 Sunbeam Tiger. Much like the contemporaneous Shelby (AC) Cobra, the Sunbeam Tiger blended a British sports car chassis with an American V8 motor. A Sunbeam Alpine roadster was mated with a Ford 260 cubic inch V8.

Interestingly, Carroll Shelby, the creator of the Cobra, also had a hand in the design of the Tiger. It was manufactured for only about four years in the mid 1960s.

Answer: Ford GT (second generation)

John Cena took delivery of a 2017 Ford GT in October of that year, signing paperwork required by Ford that he not resell the car for at least two years (standard for this wildly desired road car remake of a classic Le Mans race car). The car had a 647 horsepower V6 motor and listed for $450,000.

But Cena sold it to a dealer about a month later, making a nice profit. Ford sued Cena, and in July of 2018 they settled the case for an undisclosed amount of money, which Ford donated to charity. Somehow the car was sold again, at auction, in August of 2018, for $1.5 million. And then again for a slightly lesser amount. Amazingly, it looked about to get its fifth owner when Mecum auctions listed it for a May 2019 auction, but perhaps under pressure from Ford the listing was removed. Even after all those owners the car has only been driven between 600 and 700 miles. That's understandable from a collector's viewpoint, but sad from a driver's view.

Answer: Characteristics such as softness of the tire compound

Pirelli is the tire manufacturer that in 2021 supplies Formula 1 (F1) teams their tires, and those tires are very different from the tires you and I buy for our cars. Most people want long lasting tires that can go many thousands of miles, or perhaps high performance street tires that still last several thousand miles.

However, F1 tires are compounded to last less than one race. Each team has access to three types of dry weather tires and two for wet weather. The different types vary in degree of hardness, or softness if you prefer, with harder tires not giving as much grip (and thus less speed) but lasting a bit longer, and softer tires being faster but wearing down more quickly.

When to do pit stops for tire changes during the race and which compounds to use are a major element of race strategy. Softer tires mean a faster car but more frequent pit stops. For pit crews and spectators to more easily identify the different types of tires each compound has a colored band on the sidewall. The most common are white bands for harder tires, yellow for medium, and red for softer. If you're watching a F1 race and see green bands, those are for wet conditions but without standing water, while blue signifies tires for very wet conditions.