On Thursday August 16th, more than 150 of the finest cars from the last 100 years—cars that will grace the golf links at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance on Sunday August 18—joined in the tenth-annual Pebble Beach Tour d’Elegance.

The Tour began in the Pebble Beach complex, with collector cars roaring away from the polo fields to motor past the front door of the Pebble Beach Lodge in a fitting salute to this icon of the Roaring ‘20s. The cars then took to the hills east of Monterey, driving south on the Pacific Coast Highway to Big Sur, and then returned to Carmel-by-the-Sea.

The stretch along the coast to Big Sur is one of the most beautiful highways in the world, and it gives tour participants a chance to run their cars out a bit, making it a popular leg of the drive. Unfortunately, this year much of the coastal road was thick wth fog, so the views were not as spectacular as in years past.

In downtown Carmel the streets were closed to display the stars of the upcoming Concours, letting residents and enthusiasts amble among millions of dollars of sheet metal, snapping pictures, chatting with owners, and enjoying an up-close look at the rolling works of art.

Monterey Motoring Weekend

The Pebble Beach Tour d’Elegance kicks off four solid days of automotive events throughout the Monterey Peninsula, culminating with the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, where one car will be named Best of Show from among individual class winners. This year’s record number of participants confirms the Tour’s importance as an integral part of the Concours weekend.

“We started the tour because everyone said that Pebble Beach cars are trailer queens and they are not real driving cars,” explained Sandra Kasky Button, chairman of the Pebble Beach Concours. “Today we have 160 cars out here driving.”

“The tour has actually changed the way some participants think about their cars, because they know in order to compete their car needs to be a driving car on a day like today, all the way down to Big Sur and back,” commented Kasky Button. “It has changed the makeup of the Pebble Beach Concours, and of course we have a lot of preserved cars now; it’s not all about over-restoration—it has really evolved the show and made Pebble just that much better.”

Each year the Concours honors particular automotive marques, or what would nowadays be called brands. This year’s honorees are Aston Martin and Auburn/Cord/Duesenberg, and these marques were well represented on the Tour. The beautiful Duesenbergs from the 1930s that rolled along the Peninsula included Clark Gable’s car, and more than half of the 40 Aston Martins from all over the world that will grace the field on Sunday drove the Tour.

Thursday’s tour atmosphere is much different than the one on the 18th fairway of The Golf Links at Pebble Beach for Sunday’s concours. “Sunday is all about competition, but today is about a lot of fun, driving your car,” said Kasky Button. “Sunday is pretty serious business for these competitors; they work for years to get their cars ready. Sunday is about competition and you’ll see that with the judging—there’s a crackle in the air because [entrants] want to win.”

In case of a tie between two cars within a class during the Concours judging, the vehicle that participated in the Tour will be declared the winner. Therefore, although not mandatory, Tour participation could make the difference between going home an award winner or a runner-up.

All About Driving

The Tour d'Elegance also serves another important purpose: it proves the cars are more than just works of art—they were built to be driven and are still driving today.

Ten years ago J. Heumann, then chairman of the Pebble Beach Concours, had grown tired of critiques by the English motoring press that referred to the cars at Pebble Beach as "trailer queens," a disparaging term used to describe a vehicle that is perfectly restored, carefully moved from the trailer to the display, and quickly returned to the trailer—and rarely, if ever, driven on the open road.

As a driving enthusiast, Heumann wanted to see cars that compete on the lawn at Pebble Beach on the basis of beauty and authenticity prove their mettle in a driving event—thus the Pebble Beach Tour d'Elegance was born.