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The Highlight of His Life
Part the
First
A decision is made, following
a personal tragedy where his wife takes the first steps to booking a
ticket to the Goodwood Festival of Speed, held each June in the splendid
grounds of Lord Charles March’s estate in Chichester. Lord March always
describes the gathering of exotic racing cars and motorcycles along with
their erstwhile drivers held over a 3 day period as “a little event”.
It is anything but.
Witnessing past and present
heroes running the machinery, a lot of which is irreplaceable and
priceless up the hill climb course turns out to be one of the high lights
of his life.
A 15 minute trip from his brother`s house
in Southampton finds him walking from the car park towards the entrance of
the estate. He catches no more than a glimpse of the Lord’s mansion when
he walks past a German visitor giving live commentary to the footage he is
filming……”das est Gootvood….” Somewhat surprised at the reverence shown by
the German he walks on and presents his ticket at the main entrance. On
admission to the estate he instantly understands the approach taken by the
German for what he starts to see far exceeds the numerous articles he has
carefully read over the ten year period in various motoring magazines
since the Festival’s inception.
In addition to the manor house he
immediately looks to see what form of motoring sculpture Lord March has
chosen, for every year an artistic static display is erected on the front
lawn. Previous magazine articles have always left him impressed by
previous displays each being totally unique and more impressive than the
previous years.
Button
in the 2005 F1 Honda
Honda
is the guest of honour in 2005 and the display consists of a white steel
bow 4 stories high and approximately 25 m in length. Attached to the bow
are 5 fingers (15 m in length) each placed across the top of the bow and
each rocking or see sawing back and forth at varying tempos. At the back
end of each “finger” sits a flashing aircraft warning light. At the front
are perched five Honda (powered) Grand Prix cars including the 1967 V12
Lola Honda, the 1987 Nelson Piquet Williams FW 12, the 1987 Senna Lotus 98
T his favourite, the Senna / Prost McLaren MP4 and Jenson Buttons 2004
Honda Grand Prix car.
Lancia
D50 climbing his Lordship’s drive.
He
stands and admires each as it rocks gently back and forth little realizing
that there is an example of each in the pits. He walks on and notices the
organisation involved for in one marquee he sees prawns and champagne
being sold to blazered toffs, across from that another marquee is serving
mugs of beer and sausages. Food however is the last thing on his mind, he
is glad he has come alone for now he can spend all the time he wants
looking and touching the machinery he has read so much about over a two
decade period and retained in memory to form, what he feels is a near
encyclopaedic knowledge, fuelled by an inexplicable passion.
The pits lie adjacent to the hill climb
course which has excellent grand stands on either side with 2-3 big screen
televisions and an extremely knowledgeable commentator. The cars and bikes
are housed under carpeted marquees and expect for a brief shower or two
the weather various from overcast to sunny. No sooner does he enter the
pit area he finds himself gaping at the exotica. Nothing but nothing is
mundane or scrappy or simply brought in to make up the numbers.
Attendance of a machine is by Lord March’s invitation only and does the
man live and breathe motoring. He gulps and stops to stare at the pre war
Alfas, Bugattis, Bentley’s, Delahayes and an array of cars raced all over
the world in virtually every form of motorsport.
1988
TWR XJ-S
A
special stop is made at the Jaguar pit where he spots the 1988 Le Mans TWR
car, a light weight aero bodied E-Type and the TWR XJ-S - all of which are
in, pristine nick. The E-Type has mechanical fuel injection and an alloy
block, he wonders if they have shortened the stroke for the high pressure
belt driven injection system coupled to a wide angled big valve
head tell of a life a high RPM. The finish on the interior and panels is
excellent for a racing car.
He moves on to the XJ-S and strikes up a
conversation with a team mechanic involved in the 1983-1985 racing
programme. The mechanic is part of the display and happily answers his
flood of questions. Why the standard and restrictive exhaust manifolds,
dictated by the rules comes the answer, the manual box? A Borg-Warner
5-speed, max RPM – 7 000 with non standard pistons and valve springs. The
heads he notices seem to be pre-H.E items which he attributes to having
bigger ports. Like all but a few of the priceless fragile items on display
he is allowed to physically touch and examine the car in detail. The XJ-S
is fired up and although slightly disappointed with the harsh un-V12 like
sound it makes he moves on whilst the car moves up to park ferme prior to
running up the hill.
Ex-Monte
Healey 3000
At
the top of the hill is the Rally course and he hears the bark of an Audi
Quattro, confirmed on the big screen, being driven at full bore by the
Finnish legend Hannu Mikola. The waste gate on the turbo-ed Quattro
chirps and barks as it spools and dumps pressure with excess fuel in the
exhaust turning to a bright orange flame.
He walks on to the Honda section and spends
two solid hours staring at the Japanese manufactures bikes and cars. The
highlight for him are the three Grand Prix cars, the Senna McLaren, Piquet
Williams and Surtees Loca Honda all of which are shortly to be driven up
the hill than no lesser drivers than Bruno Senna, the great Ayrton’s
nephew, Nelson Piquet junior and John Surtees himself or “Ill Grande John”
as Enzo Ferrari called him when he drove for the cantankerous impresario.
He stands a metre away from a casually
dressed Jenson Button and is awe struck as each car with its own
compliment of mechanics is periodically fired up. He ogles at the 1988
Senna McLaren which he has read so much about. He knows that Prost told
the Durbanite designer Gordon Murray, on completion of the early season
testing that the car could probably win every Grand Prix in the hands of
Prost and Senna. He knows that had Senna, whilst leading at Monza that
year, not tripped over a back marker at the chicane, the car would have
won all 16 Grand Prix. He knows that Murray had Honda developed the V6
turbo with a very low crank line which allowed gearbox guru Wieseman to
develop a dry-sumped 3-shaft gearbox and reduce the cars centre of gravity
far below any competitors. A nod is given by one mechanic, the fuel pumps
and ignition are switched on, a pneumatic starter is coupled to the back
of the gearbox and the car fires after some furious cranking. A mechanic
in the centre slowly winds the engine up in slow and then very quick
surges. The pickup is incredible for a turbo… wap wap wap…..
JDHT’s
D-Type
The ex Surtees V12 with its mechanical
injection is more problematic. He watches as the mechanic lightly touches
each of the 12 pipes on the complex spaghetti like exhaust in attempt to
single out the dead cylinder. When he does the high RPM racket is
deafening.
Part the
Second
Honda have a selection of bikes from the ex
Jim Redman 4 cylinder 125 and 6 cylinder 250`s each of which could see 18
000 RPM back in the 60`s. He is soon to catch the Legendary Freddy
Spencer take the GP 500 up the hill but not before admiring Honda`s
impressive yet disastrous 1970`s NS 500 4 stroke. Honda for policy
reasons stuck to a 4-stroke despite the 2-stroke domination by Yamaha and
Suzuki over the once illustrious 4 stroke MV Augusta’s.
The NS 500 had 8 valves per cylinder with
oval pistons in its 4 cylinders. A disastrous bike that not only never
handled but easily took half hour for even factory mechanics to start. A
very high tech bike that simply never evolved to what it might have become
he muses whilst examining one of only two examples in the world.
A
Honda heading up the hill
He finally moves on and spots a plethora of
bikes from a Scott through to an AJS Porcupine to a 1936 BMW compressor, a
3 cylinder machine with the centre cylinder being used to compress the
induction charge into the remaining 2 cylinders, highly complex for its
time he recalls reading.
There is a loud chugg-chugg in the pits as
a 1914 Blitzen Benz, splendid in white, is fired up by the company’s
mechanics before charging up the hill.
He stands behind the 2003 Schumacher F1
Ferrari as it is to be fired up. His eyes sting and as the rpm increase
is astounding by the amount of exhaust gas being dumped through the
periscope like exhaust. Despite being revved to nowhere near the V 10’s
18 000 rpm maximum he is left amazed by the
amount of air going into and out of the motor, wap wap, this alone has
made the entire trip worthwhile.
Michael’s Motor Car
He leaves the pits after pouring over
numerous other cars including the JPS Renault Lotus which Senna drove in
1986. An inspection of the cockpit reveals the scrutineer`s stickers from
various GPs, Detroit Grand Prix, Grand Prix du Canada etc. He can almost
see the famous yellow helmet appear and see the great man sawing away at
the wheel while balancing the 1300 HP car, in qualifying trim through the
barriers at Monaco.
Nowhere else he realizes would anyone get
so close to such an array of historical machinery. Not all of the cars
are historical, Fernando Alonso has come to drive the F1 Renault and so to
Olivier Panis the F1 Toyota. He walks up the hill and positions himself
right next to the barrier whilst waiting for the F1 cars, he is not
disappointed.
Seven current or very recent Grand Prix
cars take turns up the hill. They each stop where he is standing after
which maximum RPM are reached and the rear wheels are lit up in a plume of
furious tyre smoke. Television can never do justice to the incredible
sights and sounds he experiences.
Sir
Stirling was there in 2005 too...
Alas, the
crowd he notices is fickle for once the GP cars are re-pitted they
disperse and seemingly lose interest. Not him however for he is off to
the infield area where various racing car concerns have displays. He
stops at the Cosworth display and his questions are politely answered. He
recounts the tale of Sarel van der Merwe who claims to have seen 10 000
rpm in a Cosworth BDA Escort.
The
New XK – slightly disguised – did a demonstration run that year
He moves on and despite having long since
reached a point of total saturation enters the book stand area.
Motorbooks x 500 he thinks to himself as he spends two hours poring over a
fraction of the books on display.
At 17:00 he leaves through a different exit
at which is situated a display of road cars and what a display. Among
others he inspects a Chaparone built 4-door Citroën SM, a rare car in 2
door form with this 4-door version being one of only two examples.
The piece de resistance, however, is a 1957
Cadillac Brougham. One of only 8 000 built. Forget Rolls Royce, this car
on which General Motors lost thousands for each one produced had an air
suspension (different to Citroëns), a built in bar with crystal glasses
and decanters, a built in vanity case and silent pneumatic powered seat,
window etc adjustment. The roof panel was polished stainless steel and he
recalls reading that Frank Sinatra bought one to outdo Dean Martin who had
bought a customized Lincoln.
Given the stupendous amount he has seen and
had to take in he is left both exhilarated and exhausted. He is
thoroughly pleased to have purchased a two day ticket for he intends
returning to re-visit certain displays and see those he simply never had
time to visit on the first day. He does return the following day and is
exulted when realizing that the entire trip, unlike so many other
experiences he has looked forward to, has exceeded his expectations
tenfold.
A trip into the front section of Lord
March`s manor reveals a section of books on topics as varied as history
and Victorian shop fronts. He is immediately struck by the depth of the
man who has, he learns, has spent months in planning the festival.
In addition to the cars and drivers invited
the attention to detail in planning is revealed to him when the pace car
turns out to be a 1955 Chevy Bel Air. Recently restored and being the
very vehicle which was raced back in the 1950`s by the stock car legend
Junior Johnson being driven at Goodwood by no other than 75 year old
Johnson himself, a good old boy and ex moonshine smuggler on probably his
first trip out of the States.
WRC
was well represented
A Hurricane completes an aerial display as
he leaves at 18:30 on the second day and wishes he could come back on the
third. Whilst walking on a designated route across Lord March`s golf
course towards the car park, he spots a teenage lad, who clearly has no
interest in the Goodwood display playing a round of golf with his mother.
He is stunned into disbelief and mutters aloud “it takes all sorts….”
He is oblivious to the traffic jam en route
to the motorway as he repeatedly realizes that the past two days probably
constitute the Highlight of his Life.
Giles
Millard/Pics Patrick Lauson
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