The Goodwood Festival of Speed!
Trip Start
May 01, 2009
1
15
44
Trip End
Ongoing
Chichester,
England,
United Kingdom
Thursday, July 2, 2009
My trip began on Thursday morning, by hopping onto the tube then catching a train from London Victoria station to Chichester. I managed to get a reasonably priced return ticket for ₤7.50 (around NZ$19.00) which was handy. Once I arrived at Chichester I had to figure out how to get to my camping ground, Chichester Lakeside. After a quick visit to the tourist information place, I started my long walk. My long walk in the searing hot sun. During a heat wave. With a small suitcase, a backpack full of stuff, a tent and a sleeping bag…not fun, particularly when you make a wrong turn and extend the walk by another 10-15 minutes.
VW with F5000 back half chassis
Once I arrived at the camping ground, I put up my tent in between some big trees – good for keeping the hot morning and evening sun off the tent, not so good for covering my tent in bird shit!
The following morning, after an early nights sleep I walked to Chichester again to catch the bus (₤4.50 return) to Goodwood Estate. When I entered I first went into the Cathedral Paddock, and looked around the mostly older cars there. Some of the more interesting cars I saw included a VW Beetle with a Formula 5000 back half chassis, a few NASCAR cars (including the oldest one in existence, a 2009 model Camry, an ex-Jeff Gordon Chev and an ex Dale Earnhardt car too), the 1999 BTCC winning Nissan Primera, a 2003 Mercedes DTM car (which was a work of art) and a bunch of older sports cars. In the Cathedral Paddock I also saw a car called the 'Stanton Special’, which was homebuilt by the Stanton Brothers in New Zealand. It has a supercharged Gipsy Major aero engine, and has held many past land speed records for Australasia, and has also done an 11.7 second quarter mile!
I witnessed a few of the different classes of cars going up the hill from just downhill of the track crossing bridge, then made my way up the track to the forest rally stage
DAF V8
. After watching a few cars there, and once I’d had enough of choking on the dust, I walked up to the hillclimb top paddock and looked through the rally stage pits. There was a lot of famous old Group B cars there, and I saw a few famous faces too.At the end of the day I caught the tractor shuttle back down, and caught the last bus of the evening which left at 7pm. Another walk back to the camping ground and it was time for a shower then bed.
The Saturday and Sunday were quite similar, so I won’t bore everyone with specific details of each day. On the Sunday however I met up with Alisha and her boyfriend Laurent, so it was good to see a familiar face.
Over the weekend I saw quite a few famous people, including Sir Stirling Moss (the famous English racing driver), Jesse James (owner of West Coast Customs and present of Monster Garage), Formula One drivers Lewis Hamilton, David Coulthard, Mark Webber, Timo Glock, Pedro De La Rosa, Jenson Button and Marc Gene, Walter Röhrl (who has been voted the best rally driver of all time), Sebastian Loeb (current WRC champion), Jochen Mass, and Nick Mason (drummer of Pink Floyd)
Ferrari 250 'breadvan'
.I also managed to get autographs from Sir Jackie Stewart, Stig Blomqvist (another legendary rally driver), Eddie Irvine (ex Ferrari F1 driver), Al Unser (Indy legend) and Lord March, who owns Goodwood Estate and came up with the idea of the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
I saw heaps of awesome cars, which I never thought I’d get to see, including lots of F1 cars, Group B rally cars, Touring Cars, Le Mans Prototypes and GT racers, Silver Arrows and pre war cars.
On the Monday morning when it was time to come back, I packed up my tent in the strong winds, which made it virtually impossible. It’s hard enough to get a tent back into it’s bag ordinarily, but when the wind is blowing so strong that it blows your hat off it makes things much more difficult! Another walk back to the train station, and it was onto the 12:10 bound for London.
Overall I had an awesome weekend, and despite being expensive it was certainly worth it, and I’d definitely like to come back next year. I saw so many famous cars and people, including many that I had read about for years but never thought I’d get to see. For anyone considering going, I say do it!
