Unsung heroes: MG Maestro Turbo

The unsung heroes series seems to have become rather more occasional than I intended, but here at last is a new entry. This one has been on my list of candidates for a long time and I was finally spurred into featuring it by attending an event that celebrated its 30th birthday. Consider the Austin Maestro, a thoroughly uninspiring bread-and-butter car driven mainly by pensioners with nothing for petrolheads to get excited about. However, you may be surprised to learn that 30 years ago at the height of the performance wars, someone at Austin-Rover went berserk and added a large dose of spices to that butter, creating the hottest of all hot hatches...

Doesn't look that special, does it?