Dream meets Lord March, the mastermind behind the event, to understand how he’s created this extraordinary and very British phenomenon. With mouth-watering historic racers, the world’s greatest drivers and the first chance to see the new Civic Type R in the metal, you won’t want to miss this year’s Festival…
By Andrew Frankel
It’s 21 years since the Earl of March had an idea for a garden party. He was already working to bring racing back to the Goodwood Motor Circuit, but in the meantime he thought he could stage a small hill climb event through the grounds of his family’s vast, rolling estate.
Two decades later, the Goodwood Festival of Speed is by far the best attended motorsport event in the country after the British Grand Prix. Last year some 198,000 people came to the Festival, which is more than attended the Grand National, the Derby, or on an attendance-per-day basis, even Wimbledon.
Goodwood has become an annual pilgrimage for motorsport fans
‘I don’t think even in our wildest dreams, we’d ever thought we’d have an event that now attracts nearly 200,000 people,’ says Lord March today. ‘It makes me very proud that the people that come along are so enthusiastic about the Festival of Speed, and that they keep coming back every year.’
If there is a single reason for that, it is that the Festival has never stopped evolving, meaning there’s always something new for fans to see. Where once there was just the hill climb, now there is the Forest Rally Stage, the Moving Motorshow, the Goodwood Action Sport arena, the FoS-Tech arena, and of course, the most comprehensive collection of supercars found anywhere in the world, not to mention the participation of the vast majority of modern F1 teams.
But it is the people every bit as much as the cars that the fans come to see, and this year there will be perhaps the greatest assembly of superstars ever to visit Goodwood, let alone any other motoring event. From Lewis Hamilton to John Surtees, Mark Webber to Emerson Fittipaldi, and with Jenson Button, Tom Kristensen and John McGuinness plus literally dozens of other household names including Festival Patrons Sir Jackie Stewart and Sir Stirling Moss due to attend, anyone even mildly infected by the motorsport disease should find themselves helplessly drawn to Goodwood for the last weekend of June.
An early race at the Goodwood circuit
‘There’s certainly nowhere else in the world where you can get so close to the most legendary drivers and cars as here,’ explains Lord March. This also allows the public to step back in time to an era they may have missed but which they still regard as a golden age of motorsport. ‘Everyone from Stirling Moss and Juan Manuel Fangio to Jim Clark and John Surtees raced at the Motor Circuit in that period, and that connects Goodwood to a magical era of motor sport that a lot of our visitors weren’t around to experience.’
If there is to be a highlight this year, it is the very real possibility that the hill record, that has stood at 41.6sec for 15 years, will be broken having been set by Nick Heidfeld in a modern F1 car. However nine times World Rally Champion Sebastien Loeb is coming in his 875bhp Pike Peak rally car and the word is he has power under his right foot, not to mention the skill and determination to pose a real threat to the outright record.
The best formula one cars in Lord March’s back garden (Williams- Honda FW11B at Goodwood, 2005)
Honda at the 2014 Goodwood Festival of Speed
One of Honda’s most exciting new cars in years will be making its UK debut at this year’s festival. A concept version of the fire breathing Civic Type R hot hatchback will be on the Honda stand before going on sale in full production form next year, the same year in which Honda returns to Formula 1 as an engine supplier to McLaren. The stated aim of the Type R’s designers that it be like ‘a racing car for the road’ leaves no doubt as to the seriousness of their intent.
And while you can’t quite drive the Civic Type R just yet, you can do the next best thing and take part in a weekend-long series of races on a specially built track using remote controlled models of the hot hatch. Each race will feature full live commentary, winners will receive victory wreaths and a live leader board will run throughout the weekend.
The all-new Honda Civic Type R Concept will be on show at Goodwood
For those who want to get even more involved in the action, Honda will once again be bringing a wide range of off-road motorcycles to Goodwood for anyone to try their hand at dirt biking. There will be expert tuition from three-time World Motocross Champion, Dave Thorpe, and multiple British Motocross Champion, Steven Sword, and you can ride anything from a CRF50 to a powerful CRF250X. You don’t even need a licence and best of all, there’s no fixed payment so all we ask before you take part is a donation to the official Goodwood charity, the Chestnut Tree House Children’s Hospice.
Experiencing Goodwood
For anyone attending the Festival, planning is vital because the site is so large and features so many different areas – with so much to see, you don’t want to waste time retracing your steps. At the very least, make sure you visit all the car paddocks, have a programme for drivers to sign and don’t be shy about approaching them. Most drivers regard the Festival as a busman’s holiday and a chance to catch up with old friends, so are usually in a relaxed and chatty mood and all will have been briefed that being friendly to the fans is as important as being spectacular in their cars.
Lord March, founder of the Goodwood Festival of Speed
So what single moment in those 21 years best encapsulates the spirit of the Festival? For that the answer can come only from the greatest show-goer of them all, Lord March himself.
‘It has to be seeing Dan Gurney tune his V12-powered Eagle Weslake F1 car. One of the greatest drivers of all time with the most beautiful GP cars ever built and something no driver would ever do nowadays.’
The Goodwood Festival of Speed is full of magical moments like this. But don’t take our word for it, come and see for yourself.
