Dylan Campbell

WE WERE LIVING THE DREAM. WE ALL WANTED TO WORK FOR MOTOR AS TEENAGERS

IN OUR TWO-STOREY OFFICE in Oakleigh in Melbourne's eastern suburbs, the clock struck 4.30am, the automatic fluorescent lights went off again, and the four of us sat forlornly at our desks in the light of our computer screens. Staff journalist Louis Cordony, barely old enough to buy liquor without ID, was despatched to weave through the dark, empty cubicles to turn the lights back on. As a new team and for me, as a new editor, it was our first-ever MOTOR magazine deadline sometime in 2013. We barely knew what we were doing.

But we were living the dream. We all wanted to work for MOTOR as teenagers.

Over the years we got better at producing the magazine on time, but only just. For the seven or so years I was Editor, we regularly pushed the limits of how late we could squeeze road-tests fresh from Europe, scoops with red-hot spy shots or hastily-organised eleventh-hour comparison tests. It meant being first but every single time, after yet another Grill'd-fuelled deadline with backto-back 12- or 15-hour days, we'd say 'never again'... and then do it all over again.

But in something akin to Stockholm Syndrome, the deadlines are remembered with affection. There were many other moments that conjure the same feeling. Check page 78 of this issue for the time we managed to get a Lamborghini Aventador, Lexus LFA and Ferrari 458 Speciale into the same place at the same time for a 'non-comparison' (as we later had to explain to Mr Ferrari over the phone). Myself, deputy editor Scott Newman and Cordony were all in our early- to mid-twenties and in the photos it very much showed. From memory, we had to get an exemption from Ferrari to drive the Speciale with its age limit of 28. We were simply too young.