Prowling the paddock at the 78th Goodwood Members’ Meeting

The 78th Goodwood Members’ Meeting

The Goodwood Revival may grab headlines as being the premier event for historic motorsport, but for those closest to the Goodwood Road Racing Club, it’s the Members’ Meeting that really revs their engines, which this year fell on 16-17 October.

So the 2021 offering may have lacked the trademark daffodils that come with its usual calendar slot in March/April, having been postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but it lacked none of the usual excitement with wheel-to-wheel racing between everything from priceless 1950s Ferraris to Triumph Dolomites – and all manner of machinery in between.

New kids on the block

A perennial highlight of the Members’ Meetings is seeing racers that would be deemed too new to take part in the Revival tackling Goodwood.

Triumph’s groundbreaking 16-valve Dolomite Sprint is one such machine, spending the weekend duelling with the father of the modern hot hatch, Volkswagen’s Golf GTI.

If in doubt, flat out

Rally cars play a bigger role in the Goodwood Festival of Speed, but the 2021 edition of the Members’ Meeting marked the first time the event had run a competitive rally stage.

Among the stars at this year’s event were a couple of significant Subarus, including Juha Kankkunen’s World Rally Championship Impreza. The Finn famously beat Richard Burns in his home rally in 1999. 

Lancia lightning

The Lancia 037 was designed with the sole purpose of winning the World Rally Championship, and after achieving that feat in 1983, Abarth gave the model an injection of power with a run of 20 Evoluzione 2 cars, of which this is one.

Larger 2.1-litre engines with water injection were fitted, endowing the model with 350bhp, while kevlar and carbonfibre bodywork reduced the weight to just 960kg. 

Flying Falcon

Among the competitors in this year’s Pierpoint Cup was none other than Classic & Sports Car’s own Julian Balme, who took part in his Ford Falcon Sprint, a veteran of the very first Goodwood Revival.

It was great to see Frank the Falcon driven by Balme and Top Gear’s Chris Harris on track, even though the team retired from the race.

Make do and mend

It’s amazing what you can achieve with a big hammer, a roll of gaffer tape and a good dose of determination. Despite coming in from its qualifying session on the back of a low loader, having crashed heavily during practice, the busy pit crew soon had this Ford Mustang ready for action, completely rebuilding the driver’s side front wing.

It isn’t pretty, but it got the job done. Bravo!

Hammer down

While the high-pitched scream of historic Formula One cars and the brand-new Gordon Murray Automotive T.50 proved an aural treat, there was little to match the big-banger V8s of the Ford GT40s.

Here, the cars prepare to take to the track during qualifying, where a number of red flags made for a stop-start session. 

Joining the chain gang

No Goodwood event would be complete without a gaggle of chain gang Nashes, and our favourite was, without a doubt, the 1932 Frazer-Nash Nürburg.

The car is one of a trio made to contest that year’s German Grand Prix and was driven to the race – the sort of raid that even a modern Nash owner would be proud of.  

Storied history

If these cars could speak… As well as being a veteran of several modern Goodwood events, this 1931 Talbot 105 was campaigned extensively in the first few years of its life.

Among the races in which it took part were the Brooklands Double Twelve, the Le Mans 24 Hours, the Ulster Tourist Trophy and the Mille Miglia, where it finished fifth after a crash at the 900-mile mark.

From Monza to Goodwood

No fewer than four significant Alfa Romeo Monzas took to the track at the weekend to contest the Earl Howe Trophy, but perhaps most exciting was SF32, which hadn’t been raced competitively since the 1990s.

Gary Pearson was the man to do the honours, pedalling the priceless Alfa hard at the front of the field, before eventually being overtaken in a brave move by Lukas Halusa in his father’s Bugatti Type 35B.

Pint-sized power

One of the stars of the Ronnie Hoare Trophy for ‘60s sports and GT cars was this 1965 Abarth Simca 2000 Corsa.

Based on the Simca 1000, the car used the donor’s steel platform but with lightweight glassfibre panels that reduced the kerbweight to under 700kg.

The Abarth featured a modified Simca gearbox with six ratios instead of four – which would prove one of the model’s only weaknesses in the face of rivals from Alfa Romeo and Porsche. 

Rarified air

Who says concours cars can’t be racers, too?

Heiko Ostmann’s 1958 Devin-Porsche Spyder was a standout entrant in the Cartier Style et Luxe Fresh Air Motoring class at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, and come Members’ Meeting it contested the Salvadori Cup.

The rare glassfibre-bodied racer is built around the mechanical components of a Porsche 356B.

Back to basics

Gordon Murray’s stunning T.50 understandably stole the show when it came to more modern metal, but the design guru no doubt had fond memories of the LCC Rocket, a model that was created in conjunction with Chris Craft.

The incredibly quick single-seater paired a Yamaha FZR motorcycle engine with a 10-speed Weismann gearbox, and with a kerbweight of just 370kg, performance is blistering. This example is the second prototype of just 47 cars built.  

Grand Prix greats

When it comes to Formula One cars, few have quite the presence of the 1975 Brabham BT44B. The striking Martini-liveried machine boasts a 3-litre 460bhp Cosworth V8 and remarkable aerodynamic performance.

The model got out of the blocks quickly, leading its first race in Argentina and giving Gordon Murray his first Grand Prix win at Kyalami in 1974.

Cobra commander

The scheduling change for 2021 meant that a number of cars that competed at the Revival stayed on for the Members’ Meeting, and one of the most striking was a tribute to the 'Dragonsnake' Cobra.

Finished in circuit racing trim, it proved devastatingly quick throughout the weekend. 

Big bangers

The Fabergé-liveried Stuart Graham 1974 Chevrolet Camaro has been a regular fixture at Members’ Meetings since the 72nd event, and always proves a huge hit with punters.

Driven with commitment at all times, there’s no sight more representative of the event than the huge V8 sports car sliding through the chicane and hammering down the home straight.

A potent tonic

Think of Jägermeister-liveried racers and you’re more likely to visualise an E30 BMW than a Ford RS2000. We have German racer Mario Ketterer to thank, who convinced the drinks giant to back his Blue Oval project.

Owner Mike Bell has campaigned the car at Goodwood many times following an extensive restoration. What it may lack in outright pace it more than makes up for in terms of road presence. 

Fisherman’s friend

Duncan Pittaway is a man with one or two interesting machines in his garage, but as well as pre-war titans he also races a fabulous 1965 Plymouth Barracuda.

The quirky American is perhaps not the most natural race car, but nonetheless it’s featured in some of Goodwood’s more dramatic moments, memorably wiping out the chicane during the St Mary’s Trophy at the Revival in 2018. 

Record rarity

Of course Pittaway’s most famous creation is the fire-breathing Fiat S76 ‘Beast of Turin’, which made its Goodwood debut a number of years ago and has remained a headline act ever since.

Huge crowds gathered on Saturday morning when the car’s 28.4-litre engine was started, belching flames and exhaust gases with each stroke; such was the heat generated that the wet paddock roof quickly began to steam. 

Who needs a D-type?

No historic race meeting would be complete without a Lister ‘Knobbly’, and the 78th Members’ Meeting didn’t disappoint. This Equipe Nationale Belge car was raced at La Sarthe by Freddy Rousselle and Claude Dubois, before being crashed at the Helsinki Grand Prix.

The car was later returned to the UK and ran at the 1964 Brighton Speed Trials. Best of all, it was regularly run on public roads.

Aero giant

Another highlight of the Edwardian group was the 1911 Austin Hall-Scott, a Goodwood regular that once again contested the SF Edge Trophy.

Powered by a thunderous 10-litre four-cylinder aero engine, it sounded mighty under hard acceleration – and looked like an experience under braking!

Supercar supremacy

Jaguar XJR-15 are rare animals. They were predominantly built for a one-make series that culminated in a winner-takes-all £1m race at Spa, with everyone from Tiff Needell to Juan Manuel Fangio II taking the wheel in period.

Something of the spirit of that race series was revived at the 78th Goodwood Members’ Meeting this weekend, with several examples taking to the track at once – a sight and sound that won’t soon be forgotten.