A lime-green Jaguar XKR going sideways? Lewis Hamilton doing doughnuts in his McLaren F1 car? Electric supercars with names you can’t pronounce silently speeding past you? It can only be the 2009 Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Lord March’s annual motorsport extravaganza has come to an end for another year on his famous Sussex estate. None of the 150,000 plus show goers this year were likely to have gone home feeling disappointed after one the most varied and action packed motorsport celebrations on the calendar.
Update: Full Goodwood Festival of Speed 2009 galleryVideo: Watch our man ride up the hill in a Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano HGTE
One of the main highlights of the weekend was the Sunday Times Supercar Paddock, which had one of the most impressive hot-metal line ups ever seen at the festival. There were UK debuts aplenty – Ferrari California, 599 HGTE and Scuderia 16M, Pagani Zonda R, Porsche Panamera, Nissan GT-R V Spec, Citroen GT, Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport and the beautiful chrome Veyron Pur Sang.
The real supercar stars up the hillclimb though were three home-grown heroes. Jaguar’s Mike Cross put in an expert sideways display in the lime-green Goodwood special XKR, while Derek Bell slid the Bentley Continetal Supersport he was piloting onto the grass on several occasions. Completing the trio was the Jaguar XFR, which managed to record 225mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats in the US last year.
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In its fifth year, the Forest Rally Stage provided plenty of action for those brave enough to climb to the top of the steep hillclimb. Never a man to leave records unbroken, Sebastian Loeb set the stage’s fastest ever time in his Citroen C4 WRC car. On Sunday, his team-mate Daniel Sordo also provided entertainment on the asphalt hillclimb with a series of tyre-wrecking doughnuts.
Modern day WRC cars weren’t the only rally cars on show, however. Three Audi Quattros, a Peugeot 205, two Metro 6R4s, a Toyota Celica Twin Cam and a Ford RS200 were some of the Group B highlights, while British heroes Colin McRae and Richard Burns were remembered with their Ford Focus and Subaru Impreza WRC cars being entered.
One of the most interesting parts of the festival was the FoS-TECH pavilion tucked away in the paddock. Here in this emporium of technology was a real glimpse for British car fans into an alternatively fuelled future. With concept cars usually the reserve of far away motor shows, this was an up close and personal chance to witness some rather extraordinary engineering first hand.
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