2012 Goodwood Festival of Speed

2012 Goodwood Festival of Speed

GFS is by far and away better than any other smaller imitations. To get all these cars and drivers along with the rest of the show. The fact I live not too far away is even better!!!

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You walk past and look at the superb Lotus display, the line up of Group C cars, the super car paddock, the Royal car collection, past a pre war Mercedes, last years F1 cars, historic F1 cars, the 2012 Audi Le Mans winner, the six wheel Williams, March and Tyrrell, the motorbikes, up to the rally stage with Mikkelsen, Kopecky and Neuville doing their shift, a long chat with Jimmy McRae, the Red Arrows, the Euro Fighter and Alain Prost standing right in front of me just as my camera battery went flat and then all the trade stands all in one day. It is an amazing show.

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Long chats with the model car traders and they were telling tales of woe and poor sales. JM Toys will cease trading in September as John sells up. Russell will take on part of the business. Modelissmo selling IXO models at £10, HPi at £25 nobody else could match that. On another stall old Vitesse Mitsubishis at £5. Stock clearly is not moving. An IXO model at £10 is well under trade price.

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So I picked up a superb HPi Safari Lancia Delta for £25 but the best one a GPM Ford RS 1700T for £70. In all my years of collecting I never managed to get one of these and I have rarely seen them come up on the open market. It’s been well made and clearly from a bigger collection as there were many other race/rally built kits with it.

But for some reason GFS 2012 did not get me really excited. Have I been to too many? Have I seen all the cars before? Was there something lacking? My feet had walked quite a way on Friday so much so that even though I had a ticket for Saturday I decided not to go, I think I had seen enough. Perhaps I need to miss a few to reignite the flame??!!

…or was it this type of comment/action… I was lucky enough to be by the house just as they brought in all the Lotus cars in front of the house. The Gold Leaf Lotus 72 of Jochen Rindt pulled up just in front of me. The driver was dressed just as Jochen Rindt would have looked in period. He got out of the car and posed for some press photos. Someone behind me said that’s Jochen Rindt…sadly Jochen lost his life at the Italian GP in 1970!!

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...or was it that we had been in the queue for 25 minutes waiting for the shuttles from the rally field back to the main paddock, when a press photographer pushed his way into the front of this very long queue (all the marshals queue). With out even an excuse me or would you mind and then continued taking photos holding up the queue…

But if you have never been to a Goodwood Festival of Speed, you must, it’s still the best of its kind by miles.

Cheers
Chris

Hi Chris,

Thanks for the post and the photos. Very interesting to hear your comments on the day - sounds like it should have been superb, but it's interesting that you came out of it non-plussed. What a shame!

I hate huge crowds and having to queue so can appreciate you being frustrated by the photographer's actions. I guess though that most people queuing are not in paid employment whilst they're in the queue, not that it makes a huge difference but it helps me rationalise things and keeps me calm when that sort of thing happens.

Well done on your find and please do post some more shots if you have them. I must get to GFS one year, it's only 90 minutes from home. Maybe we could meet up?

Cheers, Steve

well done on the 1700t purchase,what a baragin!!!
nice pics too.

Never been but keep saying i will, one day. Nice find on the RS1700T. Worth going just for that!

If you have never been to GFS it is fantastic. You will not know which way to turn. There is something for everyones taste. Doing it in one day is very tough...on the feet!!!

Dont ever go on the Sunday all the idiots are out in force!!! Friday is usually the best day.

But yes I guess this year it didnt quite it the usual spot. But plenty of years have.

After years of practise we have cracked the way to get in avoiding all the queues, so no problem there. Not too many queues inside but alot of people in the narrow areas. Then the thought of rain and then sun on one day made it a difficult call to say take a waterproof or not and then have carry it around later. I must be getting too old!!?? Oh I am....

As for the RS1700T that is probably the best model find ever at GFS for me.

Will post some more pics later.

Cheers
Chris

As promised a few more photos rally related...

Not seen the 6R4 before.

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Cheers
Chris

Hi Chris,

A very large 'thank you' for the 6R4 photo. I've got one of those in my collection already ! I love the Firenza's rear wing. Epic!! The Sunbeam is quite sweet although in common with a number of cars of the era, the wheels now look a few sizes too small by modern standards!

Dare I ask..... any more photos, Chris? Cheers, Steve

more class pics...please keep them comming!

Great pic's. That Firenza is wicked.

newt5550 wrote:Great pic's. That Firenza is wicked.

Agreed: Wicked, but not necessarily stable! Steve

nice photos any of the new focus st??

An excellent report into the FoS (as always Chris!) - many thanks for telling us what this year's event was like.

Personally I have been to the event twice...

...in 1997 when the late great Tony Pond was driving a 6R4 'competitively' up the hillclimb. 'TP' was easily beating Juha Kankkunen's Repsol-liveried Ford Escort WRC, only for TP's old team mate Malcolm Wilson (Ford rally team boss) to give Juha the order to beat the Metro at any cost! I think the tyres of the Escort were in contact with more grass than tarmac on the final Class-winning run up the hill - but he still only just beat the Metro by a handful of split seconds!

...and in 2002 when I arranged for a plain white Clubman 6R4 to take it's place in the Group B section of the Cartier Style et Luxe 'concours' competition. This is a real top class society kind of event, and very fortunate for me was the fact that the 6R4 owner was more than happy to trailer his car to the event on the Thursday, and collect it on the Sunday evening - however he wasn't able to take advantage of the hospitality for two! Hence I jumped at his offer of the hospitality tickets, and Dad and I had the best time ever!

The enamel Cartier badge got us FREE access to breakfasts on private lawns, champagne lunches in marquees, exclusive track side viewing enclosures, the black tie dinner at Goodwood House on the Saturday night, and anything else we wanted to consume over the weekend! Honest, apart from petrol getting there and four nights at a local B&B, we didn't need put our hand in our pocket for any money all weekend!

After being treated so lavishly in 2002, we both decided we could never go back to the FoS as 'normal' paying Joe Public! A shocking attitude I know, but I just think it would be such a disappointment in comparison. Can you imagine queuing lol!

CDM wrote:Not seen the 6R4 before.

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Not even on the 1986 Lombard RAC Rally, Chris? It was the Harri Toivonen / Neil Wilson entry, as I'm positive you know.

C96 KOG was acquired earlier this year as it had been For Sale 'Stateside' for quite a few years. It is arguably the most original unmolested works 6R4 out there.

Dave

Ref the Toivonen 6R4 - yes saw it in period but had not seen it in modern times.

But if its only just emerged thats probably why!!

It did look like it had a certain pertina about it. Its nice to see cars unrestored without moden bits or modern bright paint on them.

Cheers
Chris

Agree totally Chris - it just needs those modern 5-spoke rims ditching in favour of some more period wheels, although I gather tyre availability is the issue.

Went on Friday as well. Interesting comments from Chris. Perversley I enjoyed the show more than I have for a few years! The weather was a bit iffy and made a bad error on the route in however I went with a bit of plan and it came off more or less. Didnt watch much on the hill other than the Pikes Peak cars and lorry and saloons (where were the WRC rally cars?!) and spent quite a lot of time up at the rally stage talking to friends and watching the cars. Other than JM didnt get time to do any model shopping and came away without spending a penny on any collectables but felt that the ticket money was money reasonably well spent. Pics up later.

Cosworth nice. Zakspeed Capri, AWESOME

newt5550 wrote:Cosworth nice. Zakspeed Capri, AWESOME

toally agree!!