Stars of the first Goodwood Speedweek
It was a different sort of Goodwood event – and yet the many highlights provided familiar feelings as motorsport’s stars shone again
SIR STIRLING MOSS WAS A HERO TO EVERYBODY WHO SAW HIM RACE IN HIS POMP AS THE ultimate professional, or in his dotage. He was King of Goodwood where, at just 19, he won his first race in a Cooper 500 on opening day in September 1948, and competed into his eighties at Revival Meetings and Festivals of Speed. ‘Mr Motor Racing’ passed away in April, aged 90, and it was inconceivable that there could be no send-off at the place where his peerless record was topped by four successive Royal Automobile Club Tourist Trophy victories, in Aston Martin DBR1S and Ferrari 250 GT Berlinettas.
In this strange year in which the COVID-19 pandemic continues to wreak havoc globally, claiming lives, threatening livelihoods and wiping out businesses, the Duke of Richmond and Gordon’s empire was in trouble. Forced to cancel 2020’s Members’ meeting, Festival of Speed and Revival – its lifeblood alongside horse racing – his grace and the GRRC team pinned their hopes on Speedweek, one special microcosm event to keep the flame burning, without spectators but live-streamed to the world. At its masked, socially distanced epicentre, Saturday’s Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy for pre-1963 GT cars delivered a fitting tribute.
As if the grid forming behind Ross Brawn’s Ferrari ‘swb’ 2119gt – Moss’1960 TT winner in familiar Rob Walker Racing livery, with the maestro’s helmet and goggles on its bonnet – was not poignant enough, drivers alighted to be joined by team-mates. After a video compilation and the Duke’s eloquent address, Maserati and Lotus racer Mark Knopfler caressed his Fender guitar on a small platform in pit number one. Silence fell as the haunting melody of Going Home, from Dire Straits’ album Local Hero, rang out. A lump-in-throat moment for all as they thought of Stirling, and Lady Susie.
Then, with dusk beginning to draw its veil over a tranquil autumn afternoon in West Sussex, the gladiators went into battle. Gary Pearson, Goodwood’s most successful driver of its second heyday with 15 wins to his credit, sat on pole in his white wire-wheeled Jaguar E-type roadster and started strongly. But young technician Harvey Stanley, driving DK Engineering’s similar car brilliantly on its second outing post-restoration, was Pearson’s equal and refused to let him get away in a mesmerising duel, clear of Gregor Fisken’s Jag and
Adrian Willmott in Tom Alexander’s Aston Martin DB4 GT.
Even old masters make mistakes. On lap 13, Pearson closed rapidly on David Clark’s Lotus Elite and Austrian Martin Halusa’s Ferrari 250 GTB/C through Fordwater towards the right-handed kink before St Mary’s, the scene of Moss’s career-ending F1 Lotus 21/24 accident on Easter Monday 1962. Halusa saw the quicker cars coming and stayed left, whereupon Clark jinked right to pass him, only to find Pearson, committed, diving into the gap. The Jaguar whacked the Ecurie Shirlee Lotus, spinning it into the bank, then cannoned into the Scuderia SSS Venezia Ferrari amidships. All three drivers escaped injury but their steeds were battered. “i feel sorry for Martin; his was the best car in the race,” rued Pearson, whose licence was endorsed for contact.
After a safety car intervention the race continued apace, with Stanley relaying James Cottingham after 22 laps. Fisken had already installed Marino Franchitti, thus Willmott went ahead. As a stunning sunset backlit Fordwater, Willmott pounded round, with Cottingham being closed upon by Scandinavian Touring Car champion Rob Huff
in Richard Meins’s E-type coupe, and Franchitti in fourth spot. As Willmott missed the pit window by seconds, Cottingham withstood enormous pressure from Huff to take the chequer, with the Franchitti brothers third and fourth, Marino ahead of Dario in Dutchman Hans Hugenholtz’s silver Ferrari 250 SWB/C, and the 4.2-litre AC Cobra of Goodwood debutant Mike Grant Peterkin and Patrick Blakeney-edwards.
Stanley was ecstatic. “two years ago I was spectating here, dreaming of racing. To win is unbelievable. I saw the accident unfold, which shook me up a bit, then [after the safety car bunched the field] James did all the hard work,” beamed ‘harv the Suave’, as commentator Sam Hancock dubbed him.
Willmott’s glory came in the twin-legged St Mary’s Trophy contest, for pre-1965 touring cars. Saturday’s was a typical humdinger, between the seven-litre Ford Galaxies of Stig Blomqvist – who planted Bill Shepherd’s Alan Mann Racing car on pole with a 1m29. 540s shot – and 2016 BTCC runner-up Sam Tordoff in Canadian Ian Dalglish’s example. Two engine failures prevented Andre Lotterer from starting Michael Steele’s Galaxie (shared with Ben Mitchell) fourth, behind Frenchman Nic Minassian in Willmott’s Studebaker Lark Daytona 500“calmed down since last year”.
Blomqvist and Tordoff went at it hammer and tongs, trading places in the amazingly wieldy monsters – as Jack Sears demonstrated in 1963 with Willment’s Galaxie – until Tordoff pulled off opposite the pits with a split oil cooler. Minassian squeezed past Blomqvist briefly, but the 74-year-old Swede thundered back past to win. “i watched Bo Ljungfeldt race this car at Karlskoga in 1964, when I was in a Saab two-stroke. Now I’m in it,”s aid Blomqvist.
Within striking distance of the big V8s, the Lotus Cortinas of BTCC champions Andrew Jordan and Colin Turkington – split by Le Mans winner Mark Blundell, in another Cortina – chased. Gordon Shedden was sixth, loving his first experience of a Mini Cooper S, ahead of Emanuele Pirro’s Alfa Romeo GTA.
With an aggregate result at stake, Shepherd led Sunday’s ‘owners’ race decider before 2002 Formula Palmer Audi champion Willmott skilfully pedalled ‘the Stud’round the outside of the Galaxie into Lavant. Shepherd tried to respond but, suspecting a puncture or something loose at the rear, settled for a safe second, knowing that Mike Jordan’s Cortina [Pete Chambers’s car] was a red dot in his mirrors. Minassian/willmott won by 1.186 seconds in total from Blomqvist/shepherd, with the Jordans third ahead of Turkington/ Oliver Taylor and Mini duo Alex Brundle/nick Swift.
Friday’s Gerry Marshall Trophy enduro was won superbly by 22-year-old Fred Shepherd and three-time Le Mans winner Andre Lotterer in the Charles Austen Pumps Ford Boss Mustang. “andre put it on pole but I had to get it off the line,” said Shepherd. “smoky or risk bogging down, I chose smoky, and several cars muscled past.” sixth at the end of the opening lap, Shepherd drew Craig Davies’s sister car past David Clark’s Bastos Chevrolet Camaro Z28, before James Wood’s Rover SD1’S diff pinion failed (as on Neel Jani in qualifying) and polesitter Nic Minassian’s BMW 530i faded.
Mike Whitaker then led, but Shepherd wrestled the advantage
from the Gordon Spice Ford Capri on the blast to Woodcote and, with brakes aglow, staved Whitaker off to the stops. Tom Kristensen (Camaro) also passed Whitaker before handing over to Jack Tetley. As Mike Jordan relieved Whitaker, Lotterer snarled back ahead to stay. Pirro in Clark’s Chevy charged down Tetley to bag second, while Jason Plato in Davies’s maroon Mustang robbed Jordan of fourth on the line.
Sunday’s reversed-grid sprint race had Gregor Marshall (Vauxhall Firenza) on pole but was red-flagged when Jason Brooks, running third in his original ex-tim Goss PJ Green Mini 1275GT, clipped the kerb at St Mary’s, rolled languidly, then spun like a top on its roof, scattering pursuers. The restart was won by Davies, who stayed sub-zero cool to keep Tetley’s larger-engined Camaro behind. Whitaker was third in Tetley’s draught, followed by Nick Jarvis in the top Rover.
Named for pioneer Selwyn Francis Edge, the fascinating Edwardian competition for the planet’s wackiest race cars was even better as two five-lap dashes. Both were sensational, with star drivers playing to
their bolides’ strengths at different parts of the track and their order chopping and changing. The Sinsheim Museum team had the 200bhp Blitzen Benz flying, thus Ben Collings prevailed on Friday, despite having no brakes from lap three! “driving a Land Speed Record car – it did 142mph in 1911 – round here is very special,” he said, having taken the chequer with Mark Walker on the magnificently spartan 200bhp Darracq thundering up alongside. Mark’s son Hughie in Nick and Pippa Hildyard’s 10-litre aero-engined Theophile Schneider just beat Julian Majzub (1916 Sunbeam Indianapolis) to third.
Collings parked the Benz with ignition problems in Sunday’s sequel, leaving the Walkers and Majzub to slug it out. All three led, but hirsute Hughie was bravest through the corners and had a cunning plan: “dad could outdrag me from the chicane so I whooshed through the doubleapex job [Woodcote] to make a gap. There were some crazy speed differentials, but we’re all slightly mad. It’s terrific fun.”rob Hubbard lay fourth in Julian Ghosh’s fast Vauxhall 30/98, before its hydroplane engine’s timing gear seized, promoting James Collins (Hudson).
Former Team Lotus mechanic David Morris grew up with the ex-reggie Tongue ERA R11b ‘humphrey,’a faithful family servant since 1962, when his late father Martin became its custodian. Morris Jr qualified the 1936 warhorse quickest for the Goodwood Trophy race, and made an early break, expecting five-time race winner Mark Gillies – who started Dick Skipworth’s ERA R3A 11th, after its carburettor iced up – to appear over his shoulder erelong.
Gillies carved the Lincoln green car through to fourth inside a lap, then passed Nick Topliss (ERA R4A) and Tom Dark (Bugatti T73C) in short order to get clear sight of Morris. Gillies shot ahead into Madgwick on lap seven and wriggled clear, only for a plug to oil up, leaving the engine spluttering on five cylinders. Thus Morris pounced on the penultimate tour to repeat his 2013 win. “i race so rarely these days that I didn’t know how hard to push, but Mark was unlucky,” he said.
Gillies salvaged second, with James Baxter a superb third in his
Riley-era, looking great on 19-inch wheels and charging from seventh. Topliss and Dark were shuffled back to fourth and fifth, ahead of Gary Pearson, whose ERA experience – guesting in Charles Mccabe’s R5B ‘Remus’– began in qualifying. “i started too cautiously,” said Pearson, who climbed to fourth before slipping back. Ian Baxter (Alta 61S) led boldly on lap one before spinning at Lavant, but fought back to seventh.
Bob Boughton, who spanners Alan Baillie’s cars, was cock-a-hoop to have Mclaren GT racer Michael O’brien (ex-rodney Bloor Brabham BT14) and Jon Milicevic (ex-doug Serrurier Lds-climax 7) on pole and third for the Glover Trophy 1500cc F1 race, split by six-time winner Andy Middlehurst in John Bowers’s Lotus-climax 25. Baillie’s Lotus-brm 24 wasn’t ready for Sam Wilson, so the Fjunior ace ran his ex-dave Charlton Ecurie Tomahawk Lotus 20/22 in its South African F1 guise with a 1500cc Ford twin-cam engine and 70kg of ballast! He qualified fourth in a fine field, ahead of Nick Fennell’s 25, in 1963 Monaco GP aeroscreen spec.
Despite O’brien being apprehensive, his machine hooked up well as the Union Jack fell. He dominated, streaking away from Middlehurst’s increasingly smoky car. Wilson got an oil bath as his relentless efforts to usurp Middlehurst were scuppered by traffic and a skilfully placed car. Fennell annexed fourth from Milicevic at mid-distance, with Mark Shaw sixth in his ex-works Lotus 21, now with a Colotti gearbox. Having led a quartet of wailing V8s for several laps, Richard Wilson (ex-bruce Mclaren 1962 Monaco Gp-winning Cooper T60) repassed Andrew Beaumont’s ailing Lotus 24 a lap from home.
Marino Franchitti put on a wonderful demo from pole in fatherin-law Nick Mason’s ex-moss Maserati Birdcage to outrun James Cottingham’s grunty Tojeiro-jaguar in the Lavant Cup race.“i overheated the rear tyres and had nothing left,”he smiled, explaining Cottingham’s mid-race advances. Driving the 1220cc Lola-climax Mk1 that won Goodwood’s final contemporary race in July 1966, Ben Adams gapped Jaguar-powered Fred Wakeman (Cooper T38), Phil Quaife (Lister Flat-iron) and Martin Stretton (in Stefan Ziegler’s fabulous Ecurie Ecosse D-type) before his diff sheared. Wakeman fell to an engine issue, promoting Quaife to the podium.
The pre-1961 grand prix set devolved into a Gordon (rear-engined) versus Richmond (front) tussle between Will Nuthall in Giorgio Marchi’s Cooper T53 and Miles Griffiths in Philip Walker’s Lotus 16. Both reset class records as they left German Rudi Friedrichs (ex-jack Brabham T53) behind. The best battle was for fourth between the contrasting Lotus 18s of John Chisholm (ex-jim Clark/innes Ireland) and Andrew Beaumont (Udt/laystall). Beaumont grabbed the place after a long caution while Nick Topliss’s battered ex-moss T53 was removed, having hit the bank approaching Lavant.
The Whitsun Trophy was almost decided on the opening lap when second qualifier Tony Sinclair’s Lola T70 was tagged out at St Mary’s by Shedden’s Ford GT40 and leader John Spiers gyrated his ex-lothar Motschenbacher Mclaren M1B at Lavant. Top qualifier Mike Whitaker (T70) gathered his thoughts through a safety car interlude, then repelled the GT40S of Shedden and James Cottingham to repeat 2018’s win. Spiers recovered impressively to fourth, setting fastest lap.