The Saints – Keepers of the Faith (and Factory Trim)

There are three kinds of car owners in this world. The first group—the saints—are the guardians of automotive history. These are the people who own a 1996 BMW E39 that looks as though it just rolled off the Munich production line yesterday. Every bolt, every panel gap, every obscure piece of trim is correct and present, as if it were a religious obligation. And in a way, it is.

They don’t just change the oil; they research which exact brand and viscosity was recommended in the owner's manual from 20 years ago. They don’t park their cars under trees because bird droppings contain acid. And if the paint gets even a whisper of a scratch? The world stops until it's fixed.

These people are the last line of defense against automotive decay. They are warriors, protecting us from a future where every surviving Mk1 Golf is either matte black and fitted with a JunkMail turbo or a rusted-out husk sitting in a scrapyard with a family of squirrels living in the engine bay.

The Sinners – Daily Driving a Cry for Help

Then there’s the second group—the sinners—the ones who treat their cars like disposable Bic lighters. These people will drive a once-glorious Mercedes W124 until its timing chain sounds like a bag of hammers being shaken by a toddler and then act surprised when it stops working.

And let’s be honest—ruining a W124 takes effort. These things were built with the durability of a Cold War bunker and engineered to outlive most civilizations. You could drive one through a warzone, fill it with used cooking oil, forget to change the oil for a decade, and it would still start every morning, begrudgingly dragging itself forward like an old soldier who refuses to retire. And yet, somehow, these people manage to destroy them.

For these types of people the paint is always oxidized, the hubcaps are gone, and the headliner sags so low it’s basically a sun visor. Their idea of car maintenance is putting in half a liter of the wrong oil every 18 months and hoping for the best. They don’t believe in regular servicing, but they do believe in replacing a punctured tire with the spare and then driving on it for three years.

Oh, and let’s not forget their unique approach to vehicle repairs. Check engine light? Put a piece of tape over it. Side mirror missing? “It’s just for decoration anyway.” Wipers don’t work? “That’s what Rain-X is for.”

The Heretics – When Taste is the First Thing to Go

And finally, we arrive at the third group: the heretics. These are the people who take a perfectly good car—a classic E30 BMW or a clean Mk5 Gti —and proceed to modify it so extensively that it looks like something designed by a hyperactive child who’s just discovered crayons.

Enormous wings that produce zero downforce. Fluorescent green wheels. A chrome-wrapped Civic that’s somehow more reflective than the sun itself. Stickers declaring "Built Not Bought" on a car that was, in fact, bought and then ruined.

They slap on exhausts the size of water mains, install subwoofers that shake other people’s dashboards, and add so many LED lights that driving behind them feels like following an alien spacecraft. They have abandoned all subtlety, all sense of proportion, and, quite frankly, all shame.

The Unsung Heroes: Saab Owners, the Last of Their Kind

But the true saints? They don’t just preserve the obvious classics. No, the real heroes are out there right now, keeping a 2008 Saab 9-3 looking brand new.

And let’s be clear—keeping a Saab original isn’t just dedication; it’s madness. Saab doesn’t exist anymore. It’s gone. Dead. Buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in Sweden, while its last remaining spare parts are hoarded by a handful of lunatics who refuse to let go.

Want a new climate control knob? Better start befriending some Swedes online. Need a replacement ECU? That’ll be one used unit available in Finland for the price of a small house. Saab owners aren’t just maintaining a car—they’re archaeologists, hunting down long-lost artifacts and reverse-engineering parts just to keep their beloved machines alive.

And why do they do it? Not because a Saab 9-3 is a high-value collector’s item. Not because it’s a Ferrari, a Porsche, or a hand-built Aston Martin. No, they do it out of pure, unfiltered love. Because they like the way it drives. Because they respect its quirks. Because the ignition is in the center console, and for them, that alone is reason enough to keep it going.

To the Saints, I Salute You

Meanwhile, the sinners let their cars decay into mobile scrapyards, and the heretics ruin theirs with modifications that make them look like they belong in a Grand Theft Auto cutscene.

So, to the saints—the fastidious, the meticulous, the obsessively dedicated—I salute you. Because when the last unmolested Mk5 Golf GTI exists, you will be the reason it survived. And for that, the world of motoring will owe you a debt it will never fully understand.

MR MINTER