Drive Cult attends the Blue Riband classic car event.
Despite the rain’s best efforts the Goodwood Revival still dazzled with its unique mixture of car racing, vintage aircraft and theatre. Drive Cult was there for practice and the second of the race days on the Sunday.
On track, the big race of the weekend - the Revival TT - was dominated by a Shelby Cobra Daytona coupe driven by former Indy 500 winner Kenny Brack and eight times Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen. From the moment it headed out on track for first practice on Friday, the Shelby was the class of the field. The race started with a damp but drying track and Brack soon built up a comfortable 20 second lead. With the race shortened by 15 minutes due to the programme running behind schedule, Brack handed the big coupe over to Kristensen after thirty of the forty-five minutes, and not long after the heavens had opened again. With the track awash the Dane had some difficulty coping with the cross ply tyres on the sodden track, at times wildly fish tailing the car down the main straight, but was still able to hang on to take the win.
Behind the Shelby, Martin Brundle made a stunning start in Nick Mason’s Ferrari 250GTO, jumping from seventh on the grid (technically sixth as the Berger/ Bryant Cobra that qualified fourth was a non-starter due to a practice accident) through to second by the second corner. The damp conditions suited the less powerful Ferrari and Brundle made the most of this with a sublime driving display. He handed over to the car’s regular driver Mark Hales on the same lap as the Shelby, but by then conditions were really too bad and Hales more or less held station around 20 seconds behind the leader to the flag. As per his Formula One commentary, in my view Brundle definitely deserved the Driver of the Day award!
Third went to the powerful Maserati Tipo 151 driven by Derek Hill (son of Phil Hill) and the car’s owner Joe Colasacco. Hill had surged through the field picking off the Cobras and Ferrari 250 Breadvan, and briefly passing Brundle before handing over to Colasacco. A slow pitstop to change drivers and Colasacco being more circumspect in the rain (probably wisely) put the powerful Maserati back behind the Ferrari at the finish.
The St Mary’s Trophy provided the most entertaining race with a true David(s) and Goliath battle between the Ford Galaxie 500 of James Woods, the BMW 1800 TiSA of Richard Shaw, and the Mini Cooper S of Nick Swift. The giant Galaxie got away first despite the damp conditions but was swiftly passed in the first couple of corners by the Mini and the BMW. The three cars changed places several times, before Woods made a firm pass on the Galaxie which resulted in the big Ford losing part of its front bumper. The BMW was then able to move away from the others to take the win, leaving Swift’s Mini to harass the big Ford for the remainder of the race. While the Ford was somewhat ponderous in the corners, the 7.0 litre V8 easily had the legs of the 1.3 litre Mini down the straights. Swift would later describe it as 'like being overtaken by a battleship'!
Gary Pearson in a BRM dominated the Richmond Trophy and in doing so became the most successful driver of all time at the Revival. The race was cut short by a heavy accident for Herbert Fabri, his Aston Martin DBR4 making heavy contact with the wall at Woodcote, which necessitated bringing out the safety car and ultimately the chequered flag being shown.
Despite all of the spectacular cars on track, the highlight of the event this year took place in the skies as Goodwood celebrated the 75th anniversary of the Supermarine Spitfire. A gap in the rain allowed the a 10-aircraft formation display to take place above Goodwood. The sound of nine Rolls Royce aero engines truly made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.
As expected, there were many stunning cars on display or being paraded, as well as those being raced. We have already featured the Monteverdi Hai 450SS, but in addition there was a beautiful Mercedes W196 Streamliner grand prix car in the Tribute to Juan Manuel Fangio.
In the Freddie March Spirit of Aviation Concours, the Boeing B17 Sally B shared central attention with the Supermarine S6A float plane, a forerunner to the Spitfire, and a replica of the original Spitfire Prototype.
Despite the poor weather it was a truly fantastic weekend and the only question remains is how Lord March and his team will top this next year? The provisional dates for next year have already been announced as the 14th to the 16th September 2012.
We have two galleries of pictures for the event; Day 1 can be found here, and Day 3 can be found here.
Gallery
