Category: races attended

Goodwood FoS: Pt.2 – F1

Directly after the classic racing bikes were a small group of modern era Formula 1 cars. No 2009 cars are allowed to take part in the Festival runs due to this season’s test ban regulations, and the running here would bizarrely count as testing and as the track commentator said, quite what they would learn doing burnouts up a 1.1-mile narrow lane remains unanswered. The F1 teams had to run older cars instead, most choosing 2008 versions with Red Bull running a 2006 Toro Rosso in a current Red Bull Racing livery. BrawnGP were the only team to bring a 2009-spec car which remained on static display in the main paddock – they claimed it is the same chassis that will appear in Germany this weekend but I think that’s PR guff. Despite this minor setback the drivers put on an excellent show, notable Timo Glock who was doing burnouts galore and getting his car sideways throughout his runs!

Timo Glock, Toyota TF108, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

David Coulthard took the morning run for Red Bull before taking the helicopter to Wimbledon where he was spotted on TV that afternoon. Interestingly, his motorhome was seen at the Renault World Series event at Silverstone.

David Coulthard, 2006 Red Bull STR1, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

Also running on Sunday were Marc Gene in a Ferrari F2008, and some guy called Pierangelo Masselli in a Ferrari F300 of 1998. I got a photo of the ’98 car, and a video of the ’08 car which I’ll keep back for now. 😉

Ferrari F300, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

Needless to say all of these cars were very loud and very energetic! I’m not sure if my hearing is going and it probably is after attending events like this, but they did seem a little quieter than usual, it’s probably me though. There was a definite difference in sound between the 2008 cars and the Red Bull and earlier Ferrari, which were both more shrill and peaky with their higher-revving engines. Once the cars had departed I headed into the infield to have a wander around, not really sure where to go next. I elected to locate some lunch and was surprised to find they were charging £5.50 for a burger!! A bit of meat in two bits of bread. Okay so it was top organic stuff from their own farm, with a fresh salad in it instead of the muck from McD’s, but still, there’s a principle at stake here. You don’t pay that for a burger. So I stuck to my packet of crisps and head to the Mercedes stand because I’d heard they were bringing the new SLR Stirling Moss Edition. Sure enough, they had!

SLRs past and present, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

I adore this car. They’d placed it next to the SLR of the type Moss had driven in events such as the Mille Miglia in the 1950s. The similarities are striking, yet the new car is unmistakebly modern. I have no idea how they did it. Several other Mercedes were on display of course, but I wasn’t that interested – what did catch my eye were the signs proclaiming Jenson Button’s interview session in this very pavilion at 3pm, so I decided I should have to come back for that. I had three hours to kill.

On The Limit – Goodwood FoS Pt.1a

I haven’t posted an ‘On The Limit’ for a while – and now I get to do several because I managed to take some very short videos at Goodwood!

I’m not saying they are brilliant, they are just your average fan videos, but they are mine and my first ever video uploads, so I’m going to show them off.

As mentioned previously, the motorbikes were the first batch I saw when I arrived – here is one of the first bikes to depart:

(John Hogan on Barry Sheene’s Suzuki)

Here is a somewhat more modern superbike:

(unknown)

I’ll continue the review over the weekend and insert the odd little video here and there!

Goodwood FoS: Pt.1 – Arrival & Bikes

The Goodwood Festival of Speed is a massive event, it is very difficult to cover the entire area in a single day, but just about manageable if you are quick. I attended on Sunday only, arriving 45m later than planned due to a combination of my own slow movement away from the house (I was unprepared!) and the slow traffic on the roads during the 2hr 15m journey.

Suitably chastising myself, I collected my pre-booked ticket at the gate just as the Red Arrows arrived at about 11am.

Red Arrows, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

I would have taken better pics but for the decision for safety reasons to hold the air display area over the car park rather than directly above the venue, thus meaning almost the entire display was obscured by trees! I’m sure it looked great to those near the House or on the cricket pitch, for those of us at the start line it was rubbish.

As the air display was coming to a close the next batch of vehicles arrived at the start line, to this day I have no idea why these two classes were batched together: classic motorcycles and current F1 cars. Wow, F1 cars straight away, great luck.

While everyone was in the infield being distracted by the planes I grabbed a space trackside at the start line. I hung around during the motorbike runs to keep the spot. I’m not really into the classic ‘bikes, I don’t know anything at all about them and I didn’t recognise a single machine what with no MotoGP presence – though I did recognise the names Mick Doohan and Carlos Checa when the announcement came that they were running (AFTER they’d left the start) – so imagine my surprise when I looked at the second bike lining up to make a run and recognised the rider!

John Surtees, the only World Champion on two wheels and four, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

John Surtees is a frail old man these days of course, and he was struggling to keep himself upright which was sad to see – until he was released on to the track, when he took off like a rocket! He was really going for it, absolutely brilliant. I’d not taken much notice of Surtees previously – here I became an instant fan.

All sorts of racing motorbikes from the 1960s to the present day followed him up the hill, including modern endurance bikes and classic sidecars. As I say, I’m not a huge fan so I didn’t get a lot of photos, for those I did get check out my FoS gallery.

I did manage to grab a quick couple of videos though.

Following the final bike was Peter Fonda, the actor from the movie ‘Easy Rider’ which is 40 years old this year. I actually haven’t seen the film so this passed me by a bit, but Mum had already told me to look out for him.

Peter Fonda, from 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed

I am writing this as a journal of the day and already we can see these posts are going to be photo- and video-heavy rather than covering a lot of words, so I think it would be a good idea to spread out the content over several posts. You can jump ahead of me if you like by checking out my photos here. In the next instalment: F1 cars!

All photos and videos © Patrick Wotton.