test drive in Autocar magazine.
David surmises that the car had
been neglected in more recent
years, possibly when it had had a
coming together with something that
damaged the nearside front of the
car. “I paid too much for it and hadn’t
realised it needed everything doing. I
managed to replace the glass on the
headlamp, which is good, as they are
really expensive. And the headlamps
have the black surrounds, which
were specific to the Trophy. This car
was on the change over so it's like a
Mk1½ with clear front indicators and
the interior changes,” he explains.
The front impact necessitated
a replacement bumper but David
had a spare one available. “It waslooked like a Trophy whilst looking at a
salvage auction website. “There was a
picture of this car. It didn’t say it was a
Trophy but it looked like one and it was
on an X-registration,” explains David.
Having decided he’d take a closer look
he realised what he’d found. He had
stumbled across Number One from
MGF Trophy production: the same car
that was used by motoring hacks.
“The car was registered on 12
January 2001 and manufactured
December 14 2000 along with three
cars manufactured that day. This
was the first. I’m not sure where the
other cars are and, if you go on a little
later, Top Gear, Autocar and the like
got involved and they are all Y-plated
cars.” This Trophy was used for thehttp://www.mgenthusiast.com MGEAUGUST 2019 51
ABOVE: The MGF wasn’t supplied with a spare wheel but David has installed one.ABOVE: This Trophy was the first
production MGF to run the MEMS3 ECU.ABOVE: ABS controller under the bonnet;
ABS was an optional extra on the Trophy.ABOVE: The MGF also has the correct
brackets to support the rear spoiler,
added in Peter Stevens’ re-design.ABOVE: MG Rover’s press release joked
that VVC stands for Very Very Clever. The
revised K-series saw power increase to
give a claimed 0-60mph in 6.9secs.ABOVE: David believes that his MGF
is the very same one that featured in
Autocar's test drive of the Trophy F. It
was reproduced for promo purposes.
looked like a Trophy whilst looking at a
salvage auction website. “There was a
picture of this car. It didn’t say it was a
Trophy but it looked like one and it was
on an X-registration,” explains David.ABOVE: The MGF wasn’t supplied with a spare wheel but David has installed one.