AWARD winning car restorer, Rob Sergeant, has enlisted the support of Radio Two DJ Chris Evans, to help get his Forest-based classic Cortina to the world's top car show in California.

"Let's do this for Rob," said self-confessed car enthusiast, Evan, live on air. "Let's get the guys at Top Gear involved. We must follow this up and get it sorted."

Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance in California is the creme de la creme of classic car shows. To get there, Rob, who lives near Lyd­brook, will need to raise about £3,000 in sponsorship to ship his car to the States and cover some expenses. He's already had backing from a company making air chambers and the application forms for Pebble Beach are waiting to be filled out.

The bid to make it to Pebble Beach comes off the back of a prize winning year for Forest born and bred Rob. His 1969 Ford Savage V6 Mark III Cortina has picked up a spate of best in concours and concours championships around the country. It culminated last month, when it wiped the floor of all competition to win this year's International Classic Car Show, beating a £3.5m Ferrari in the process, not to mention a £6m Ferrari once owned by Steve McQueen.

"This is the highest accolade than anyone can get in classic cars and it's nice for a humble Cortina to beat that sort of competition, and it's here, in the Forest," says Rob. "There are about 35-40 Savages left in the world and mine is undoubtedly the best. No one else has gone to lengths I've gone to restore my car to such an exacting standard."

Even breaking his back after falling from a ladder last December, didn't stop Rob in his tracks. The restoration of the Savage – a bespoke cortina from Jeff Uren's dealership in London – started in 1990 with what's known as a "rolling restoration". But after a valve spring broke on the way back from Cornwall, destroying the engine, Rob decided to go back to nuts and bolts with a total restoration "from the ground up".

"This means you go back to the bare shell. There's not a gromit, a nut or a washer that I haven't taken out. Everything that had metal against metal has been replaced."

The need to reach concours standard means Rob has gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure his Savage is as true to its origins as possible.

He's had rear leaf springs specially made to the Ford pattern, had wheel nuts made, sourced original Urens Savage badges and registration plate stickers, had door fittings re-veneered at Rolls Royce. He's even gone to the lengths of getting a print wheel made in America to replicate the exact typeface found on the Ford's spark plug leads.

"It was this attention to detail, the fact that the car's been mechanically restored to such an exacting standard that impressed the judges," explains Rob. But having won the UK's ultimate classic car honour, there's only one way to go now – out west.