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Christophe Hauret, known as "Le Chimiste," is the creator of the YouTube channel Miracle Motorsport. He takes viewers along on his adventures as an automotive builder, where the work is often radical. Chris, who spent 17 years as a pharmacist, is a voracious consumer of automobiles. He's owned at least 70 cars since he was 18, buying them to restore and resell. While his classmates were doing internships in the medical field, he spent his summers at his body shop guy's place. That's where he learned the trade from an old master: panel beating, welding, filler, sanding, paint.
Together with his friend Simon Duchassin, a rare car hunter at Cobalt Automobiles, the two fall for a French sports car from the '90s.
The car had landed in Simon's garage almost by accident. What they found stopped them in their tracks: a Venturi 400 GT in navy blue over beige interior, fitted with Recaro A8 seats, OZ magnesium wheels, and a carbon fiber dashboard.
Chris circles the car like he can't quite believe it's real. Simon recognizes something rare immediately. This is clearly a no-compromise machine. They exchange a look. A half-grin. What they've stumbled onto is more than a car. It's a project, a symbol. Their next mission.
But to understand why this car matters, you need to know where it came from.
In the heart of the Basque Country, in southwestern France, Chris and Simon recount the history of the brand, eyes bright, voices eager. A marque that has slowly faded from memory. The first Venturi was born from a slightly mad dream shared by engineer Claude Poiraud and designer Gérard Godfroy. In 1984, the two men built a prototype in a basement, powered by a Golf GTI engine, fitted with a Fuego windshield, and wrapped in a polyester body. In an article published by Club Venturi France, Claude's words still survive:
"One day in 1983, I went to see Gérard and told him: look, I want to build a car. If it could be beautiful, that would be a lot better, because I'm not the one who can dress it properly. But I know how to take care of the rest."
Chris, a former lowrider builder who once dreamed of producing a car bearing his own name, Hauret, the way Koenigsegg did in Sweden, sees something of himself in that origin story. Two guys in a garage, armed with vision, courage, and persistence.
The French company MVS, Manufacture de Voitures de Sport, was born. The GTI engine was dropped. It wasn't powerful enough, and it wasn't prestigious enough for the luxury segment the brand was targeting. The engineers settled on the 2.5-liter V6 borrowed from the new Alpine GTA. Other parts were sourced from wherever they could find them: a Matra transmission here, a Citroën gearbox there. The first model was the Coupé 200, followed by the Transcup cabriolet, the 260, then the 300 Atlantique. In 1986, a brand-new factory opened in Cholet, but production remained too artisanal. The assembly lines never hit their targets.
Financial setbacks piled up. In 1990, the "Y" in Ventury was swapped for an "I," a more Italian ring to it. The company adopted a new logo: a bird with outstretched wings. They relocated to Couëron, near Nantes. New leadership arrived, along with a significant investment in the Larrousse team, then competing in Formula 1.
None of it was enough. Venturi was in genuine crisis.
What came next looks, in hindsight, like a last-ditch maneuver. Stéphane Ratel, former driver and head of Venturi's competition department, proposed a bold concept: the Gentlemen Drivers Trophy. A championship built for a handful of wealthy clients who would race authentic competition cars, maintained and transported entirely at the brand's expense. For an additional fee, drivers could take their cars home at season's end, on public roads no less, thanks to modifications that made them street-legal.
And so this brutal machine was born. 408 horsepower. Barely a ton. Dog-leg gearbox. Carbon brake discs. The exterior recalled the F40, a comparison the car earned not just in silhouette but in philosophy: mid-engine, turbocharged, stripped to the essentials, built with no concession to comfort. The interior was pure spartan: deep bucket seats with wide harnesses, Kevlar door panels, plexiglass windows that vibrated at speed, and a dashboard with exposed fuses. Austere, but fascinating.
Of the 73 cars produced over two years, only about 10 received the "Kit Route," their own 400 GT registration papers, slightly more comfortable seats, and a few standard accessories. It's this road homologation that makes the Venturi Trophy truly unique.
In the 1960s and '70s, it wasn't unusual to see race cars like the Porsche 906 or Ferrari 250 GTO on public roads, driven legally. By the '90s and 2000s, that had become nearly impossible. Among the surviving examples, some carry what are known as "wild" homologations, unauthorized conversions, often done in England, in configurations so radical the cars become nearly undrivable on the street. That strict filter is why the genuine 400 GTs are so sought after today.
Which brings us back to that navy blue car in Simon's garage.
The hunt is no walk in the park. After one dead end after another, they manage to locate three cars among the 10 official road-homologated examples. Given the complexity of the work ahead, they want a car in solid condition. Mechanical parts are virtually impossible to find. Simon remembers their first promising discovery in the southeast, at the home of a former racing driver. Quite the character.
The race is on. To finance the purchase, Simon feverishly sells off parts sitting in his stock and a few cars from his personal collection. After tough negotiations, the car is theirs.
The following week, it's stripped bare on a lift.
And so begins what they proudly call their "Venturi Thursdays." They work at the shop of Laurent Dosba, Chris's mentor, who has been lending him workshop space for over 15 years. It's there that Chris repairs the fiberglass and reshapes the body lines. For the mechanical work, Maxime, a 20-year-old with a gift for engines, lends a hand. Learning and sharing around the "French F40," as it was nicknamed at the time. No commercial pressure. Just friends.
But if the atmosphere seems relaxed, burgers and mechanical debates on the menu, the work itself is punishing. They're more than a year behind schedule, and the mechanical headaches keep coming. Like the half-moon valve stem seal, a tiny part found after three weeks of investigation, wedged inside a spring. Every step is marked by adjustments, second-guessing, and deep reserves of patience.
Chris starts publishing episodes of their progress on Miracle Motorsport. From the very first one, the phone doesn't stop ringing. They realize they're onto something.
The engine mapping is tuned at Jacob Sport in Pau, and ethanol is dropped in favor of SP98. Chris develops a lift system to raise the car over the speed bumps that plague French roads. The car begins to come alive.
After months with their hands deep in fiberglass and mechanicals, Chris and Simon's paths gradually diverge. Only Christophe keeps his 400 Trophy. Priorities shift, and each follows his own trajectory. Simon continues his hunt for exceptional cars. Chris has launched into another undertaking: the restoration of a beautiful 1930s mechanics workshop he's just acquired.
Set up near Bayonne, he's creating a space where he can display his collection, work on the large-scale projects that consume his attention, and push Miracle Motorsport into another dimension entirely.
And as he puts it: "You don't have to be rich to enjoy yourself. You just have to be willing to work and have a goal. I get the same pleasure working on simple cars with a passionate owner as I do on high-end machines."
Passion above all else.
I think back to those winding roads, strapped into the bucket seats, lulled by the growling V6, tracing the magical routes of the Basque Country. With a fuel gauge that drops almost as fast as a Clio's tachometer climbs.
