Previous owner interest.

Gordini's have always had a following. Do you remember your car when you were 20?
I have spoken with the Gordini's first 2 owners during the past week and its great to know they still have a interest in the car and both are happy to know it still exists and is being rebuilt.
I was contacted by John Spry (2nd owner) a few days ago who gave me a bit of the cars history when he owned it and how he ended up with it. Today I spoke to John Sever who was the cars first owner. John tells me he was following Bruce Collier in the Australian rally series and wanted a Gordini. One afternoon he went over to Seymour's in Roseville and asked the salesman about buying a Gordini. The salesman asked how serious he was as they had one in the holding yard. John looked at the car that day and bought it. John said he thinks the salesman may have got into a bit of trouble for selling him the car as Renault wanted all the Gordini's  to be sold to rally teams. Is this the only Gordini not sold to be raced or rallied in Australia?
In 1968 an R10 sold for $1990.00 drive away and the Gordini selling for $2990.00 drive away, a lot of money in 1968! John purchased it new from Seymour's on the 17 June 1968 and owned the car for 5 years traveling 70,000 miles in it before selling it to John Spry.
John Sever put the black stripe across the bonnet due to receiving a lot of stone chips driving from Canberra to Sydney, interestingly the car has the same black stripe today albeit a bit faded now. My original plan was to paint the car in the lighter Cannes blue but now after learning some of the early history I am considering the original Moyan Blue and putting the black stripe back on the bonnet.

I am currently working on the car 3-4 hours a day mainly with body repairs. I have completed all the work in the rear (C pillars back) and have now turned to the front. I hope to have it all back to bare metal in a month or 2 ready for rust converting and priming. I'll post more photo's soon.