Jeremy Clarkson’s Ford Escort RS Cosworth could fetch £75,000 at auction

A 1992 Ford Escort RS Cosworth once evaluated by Jeremy Clarkson over 12 months is heading under the hammer at auction.

One of three ‘pre-production prototypes’, this particular Escort RS Cosworth was featured in both Top Gear Magazine and Clarkson’s Car Years, with the former seeing Clarkson running the car for a year and writing 12 different reports about his time with the car.

During Clarkson’s Car Years, the former Top Gear presenter took the Escort to the ‘Buttertubs Pass’ in the Yorkshire Dales where he proclaimed ‘one of my all-time favourite roads meets one of my all time favourite cars, the Cossie’.

The Escort RS Cosworth remains one of Ford’s most sought-after models, having been created to homologate a car destined to be used on the World Rally Championship stage. However, it remains a very rare car with just 2,500 homologation special versions ever produced.

This particular pre-production car is rumoured to have cost over £250,000 to produce and had a number of features which differentiated it from a standard Cosworth including a deletion of the catalytic converter. It’s finished in ‘Mallard Green’ with a contrasting ‘Raven Hide’ interior and still retains its original Ford Motor Company registration plate. A clean underside – still with its original sealant from the Ford factory – showcases this car’s spotless bill of health.

Now, the Ford Escort RS Cosworth is heading under the hammer via Iconic Auctioneers at its event on August 24 where it could fetch up to £75,000 when the hammer falls. A famous Ford previously sold by Iconic Auctioneers – Princess Diana’s black Ford Escort RS Turbo – had a final winning bid of £650,000, so there’s a good chance that this Cosworth could breeze past its estimate.