Gearhead Smorgasbord: The Goodwood Festival of Speed

We are blessed to live in a time when nearly anywhere in the world can offer up a pretty enticing calendar of automotive events. However, there are certain special gatherings that really truly are unique and capable of popping the circuits clean out of your average automotive enthusiast. The Goodwood Festival of Speed held on the grounds of the Goodwood Estate in the Sussex Downs region of England is one of those flat-out amazing events.

The Festival of Speed is the brainchild of the current Earl of March, Charles Gordon-Lennox who is a massive gearhead. The Earl put together the first Festival 20 years ago as an effort to provide a venue for car fans to see rare and significant cars in action and also up close. The first event saw a fairly small amount of cars on the roster, but the concept was proved sound when 25,000 people show up to enjoy a day in the English countryside. The Festival has now grown in provenance and popularity to the point that it sells out every year with 150,000 souls through the gate and the line up of cars, drivers, manufacturers, and teams reflects the top echelon of the automotive worlds. The auction held on Thursday during the event by Bonhams even managed to net the highest ever sale price for a single car when Juan Manuel Fangio’s Mercedes racer crossed the block with a final hammer of nearly twenty million pounds. The Earl also hosts the Goodwood Revival in the fall which is dedicated to vintage races and other period activities, but the Festival is open to all eras of sporty cars.

 
To really appreciate how huge this event is you need to take a survey of all the different types and eras of cars and motorcycles that show up. I managed to see modern and vintage Formula 1 cars driven by world champion drivers from five decades, drag racing cars and bikes, versions of the world’s fastest sports cars from the earliest to the modern day, rally cars from many different eras racing through a forest stage, a great selection of competition motorcycles, and other significant cars up close and personal with only a stack of hay bales separating fans from the racing surface or with no separation at all in the paddock.

 The event also included huge multi story outdoor displays from all the major auto manufacturers, an airplane display area, flyovers by Vulcan and Typhoon war planes, and paddocks full of interesting things to look at. As noted above, Bonhams holds an onsite auction on Thursday where you can take home a very nice souvenir if you can swing it. There is even a “moving motor show” on Friday where ticket holders can try out the latest offerings from dozens of manufacturers on test drives around the estate.

To try and describe everything I saw would take pages and pages of droning on, so I will let the pictures and video below do the talking. If you truly love sports and competition cars, you need to find a way to make it to this event at some point as it is truly nirvana for gearheads. There are many fine tour companies that organize all-inclusive trips (I used Grand Prix Tours www.gptours.com) so save some bucks, block off a week to head over the pond, and prepare to have your mind completely blown when you visit the FoS in 2014.

 
Video can be found by clicking here