This year’s Goodwood Revival was yet another professional display of the talents of Lord March’s team. It’s fair to say that they are probably masters of creating the perfect balance of ambiance, atmosphere, exciting racing and a direct line to upstairs for ordering perfect weather.
If you were unable to make it in person, stand by for the Goodwood production team’s regular broadcast special on a channel near you. If you can’t wait that long, why haven’t you been subscribing to the Goodwood Road and Racing YouTube channel? Our personal favourite clip is the brave overtake by Chris Ward in the E Type, around the outside of the Cobra for the lead. The perfect demonstration of the term ‘carrying speed’.
Bruce McLaren Tribute
The Bruce McLaren Tribute was poignant, with the beautiful CanAm cars lined up on the grid. ‘Bruce McLaren was a talented engineer and a world class racing driver,’ observed Lord March at the start of his tribute to the great New Zealander, the Goodwood Revival this weekend celebrating 50 years of the McLaren marque. ‘He was highly-skilled, meticulous and always fun.’
An evocative collection of cars associated with McLaren’s career lapped the Goodwood Motor Circuit, recalling a career that encompassed four grands prix wins as well as victory in the 1966 Le Mans 24 Hours.
Shelby Daytona Coupes
An evocative line up of Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupes headlined an outstanding opening day at the 2015 Goodwood Revival.
It is believed to be the first time that all six original examples of Carroll Shelby’s creation have been brought together, including the prototype, plus veterans of races at Le Mans and Goodwood.
The six, aggressive Kamm-tailed GTs powered round the Goodwood Motor Circuit track in an evocative display that brought back memories of the car’s World Sports Car Championship winning year, 1965. All have been on display at a recreation of the 1965 Sebring pits: like Goodwood itself, one of the Cobra’s seven victories that year.
The powerful JD Classics team won three races and came second in its fourth at the world-famous Goodwood Revival over the weekend – including a win in the iconic RAC TT Celebration race. The Maldon-based classic car experts were also a major sponsor of this year’s celebration of vintage motor sport, providing three course cars.
Their most notable success of the weekend was in the RAC TT Celebration – one of the most incredible races of the event, featuring a grid estimated to be worth in excess of £150m. In a race traditionally dominated by the powerful AC Cobras, JD Classics drivers Gordon Shedden and Chris Ward put in an excellent qualifying performance to take second-position in the Lightweight E-Type. Their time was just half-a-second behind the pole-sitting Cobra, which set a new track record of 1:25.1.
As the race rolled around, Chris Ward got off to a slow start, dropping back to fourth position. But over the next few laps, Ward drove the E-Type hard, battling the Cobras ahead of him every step of the way, pulling off tricky overtakes to snatch second place. Chris finally picked his moment, overtaking the leader in a magnificent sideways move in to Woodcote that saw him pushing the limits of his car and the track. As Gordon Shedden took over, he continued pulling away from the second, third and fourth-place Cobras to take an incredibly impressive win in the RAC TT Celebration by nearly 15 seconds.
As the mornings grow cooler in England and we have to clear the windscreen of condensation in the mornings, it will be some time before another Goodwood Revival, though we have the 73MM meeting of course just as soon as the winter releases it’s grip.
Meanwhile, scroll down for some more images of Goodwood 2015 and enjoy the atmosphere of historic motorsport.
