Tag: Goodwood

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Motor Shows

Dates announced for 2011 Goodwood Festival of Speed

Goodwood FoS

The Goodwood Festival of Speed has pencilled in its dates for 2011, something which can only be done once the Formula One calendar has been signed off. By fitting around the movements of F1 Goodwood organisers can ensure a high participation level from the teams and drivers who will be in the UK for British Grand Prix, scheduled for the weekend after the FoS.

That means the Goodwood FoS dates for 2011 are 1–3 July. The Goodwood Moving Show will also return in 2011 and it will take place on 30 June.

Entry to the FoS is by advance ticket sale only and you can buy your tickets to the 2011 show via the official website from Monday 1 November.

Full press release after the jump.

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Motor Shows Porsche

Goodwood FoS: Porsche 911 GT2 RS explained

Porsche 911 GT2 RS

The fabulous 620bhp Porsche 911 GT2 RS made its public debut at the recent Goodwood Festival of Speed. In this video (available below) Andreas Preuninger, Manager of High Performance Vehicles for Porsche, talks us through some of the things that make the GT2 RS so special.

[via The German Car Blog]

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McLaren Motor Shows

McLaren MP4-12C at the 2010 Goodwood FoS

McLaren MP4-12C

The official public reveal of the new McLaren MP4-12C supercar took place at the Goodwood Festival of Speed last weekend. In fact, it was the first car to make the run up the hill this year, informally opening the show, as it were.

McLaren have released a short video of the weekend’s activities and the sound of the 3.8 litre V8 is rather tasty. From the footage shown Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton weren’t exactly hanging about, either.

Antony Sheriff, McLaren Automotive Managing Director, reckons Goodwood was the ideal place to debut the company’s newest road car, “The visitors to our stand were the perfect blend of car enthusiasts and potential customers; I’m delighted that we chose Goodwood Festival of Speed to unveil the 12C to the public. Two British Formula 1 World Champions were behind the wheel of the car as we led the field up the hill. A major landmark, delivered to McLaren’s high standards.”

More after the break.

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Formula 1 McLaren Motor Shows

Bruno Senna’s home movie

McLaren MP4-8

The video below features some in-car footage of Bruno Senna driving a McLaren MP4/8 at the Goodwood Festival of Speed over the weekend. Truth be told it’s a pretty crappy clip, filmed on a mobile phone. But, when you stop to think about it, how many times do you see amateur in-car footage filmed from inside a Formula One car like this. That alone, makes this clip very, very cool!

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Holden Motor Shows

Hay stack

HDT VH Commodore @ Goodwood FoS

The Goodwood Festival of Speed usually brings out some classic old racecars out for a run up the hill. Sometimes those classic machines don’t always return home in the pristine condition they arrived in. Here you can see Peter Champion, driving his former Brock/Perkins HDT Commodore, got things a little bit wrong during Friday’s action.

Champion ran wide, got into the grass, before ultimately punting the VH Commodore into the hay bales. Thankfully those bales helped to minimise the damage and repairs to the car which won the 1982 James Hardie 1000.

Speaking after the incident Champion said, “The brakes don’t get hot enough to work so I was relying on second gear to slow me down. Only problem was – I went for second and got fourth!”

The Commodore’s General Motors roots came in handy and Champion sourced a replacement steering rack from a 1982 Vauxhall Carlton and was back racing again on Saturday.

[Source: Goodwood FoS | Thanks to Terence for the tip and the pics]

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Mercedes-Benz

Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG at the 2010 Goodwood FoS

Mercedes SLS AMG @ Goodwood FoS

The action is well underway at Goodwood and here’s another clip bringing you a step closer. It features the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG ‘Gullwing’. There’s a mix of in car action and outside footage as the car rips its way up the famous Goodwood hillclimb course.

You can see the clip after the break, and there’s a bonus clip available as well.

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Motor Shows Porsche

Porsche at the 2010 Goodwood FoS

Porsche @ 2010 Goodwood FoS

Porsche have released a couple of videos giving an insight into their presence at the 2010 Goodwood Festival of Speed which is currently underway.

Further you can keep up to date via the Porsche UK website.

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Alfa Romeo Motor Shows

2010 Goodwood Festival of Speed

Alfa Romeo statue - Goodwood FoS

The annual Goodwood FoS kicks off tomorrow. Each year there is a centrepiece statue unveiled in front of the main building. This year, in honour of its 100 year anniversary, Alfa Romeo got the gig.

Somewhat amazingly the sculpture features an Alfa Romeo P2; there are only two of these cars in existence and their value is estimated at around AU$30 million. The car featured in the work was used to win the world’s first championship for grand prix cars back in 1925. It’s a pretty special car to have hanging off an oversized coathanger; don’t you think! Alongside the P2 is an otherwise common as muck 8C Competizione.

Alfa will be sending over 50 cars from its museum for the show, including the first UK showing of the new Giulietta.

To keep up to date with what’s happening in Lord March’s backyard keep an eye on the official FoS website. Twitterists are also catered for and Autocar also has some good info.

[Source: Autocar]

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News Rolls-Royce

High Rollers raise stakes

Rolls-Royce - Spirit of Ecstacy

Rolls-Royce is bucking the trend of financial disaster in this carpocalypse now era. Yesterday, the Goodwood based company proudly announced a 20 per cent growth in sales during 2008. Last year 1212 Rollers found new homes, up from 1010 in 2007. That marks their fifth consecutive year of increasing sales.

“This is a tremendous result and particularly gratifying considering the challenging economic environment manufacturers faced in the second half of 2008,” said Tom Purves, Chief Executive Officer, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars. “Once again much of this success lies with the highly skilled and dedicated workforce that we have at Goodwood”.

Given the gravity of the financial meltdown in the United States some may be surprised to learn that almost 40 per cent of Rolls-Royce deliveries headed Stateside. Northern Europe and the Middle East also saw big spikes on 2007 figures, up 95% and 48% respectively. Even Australia did its part in boosting BMW’s balance sheet in the RR column, with sales also growing here.

It will come as no surprise that the most successful Rolls-Royce dealer worldwide is in Abu Dhabi. While Beijing, Beverly Hills, Dubai and London rounded out the top five.

Can sales continue to grow for a sixth consecutive year? I can’t imagine the chaps at Goodwood are banking on that. However, preparations are underway for the introduction of a brand new model series, currently named RR4, due later this year (design sketch images below).

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Fifth Gear

Fifth Gear – Series 14, Episode 4

Apologies for the late update to this week’s show. Jason Plato—AUSmotive’s preferred Fifth Gear presenter—started the show comparing the JDM Honda Civic Mugen RR v the UK spec 2000 GT. The Japanese Civic was the quickest around their test track, and by some margin, plus it sounds bloody good, too.

I didn’t want to mention Tim Shaw this week, but given he covered the revised CO2 taxes UK residents will be paying shortly, I thought it would be worth raising, given our federal government’s recent issues with its proposed Luxury Car Tax increases. I’m guessing it won’t be long until we’re paying taxes based on emissions here in Australia too. They highlighted a Volkswagen Golf 1.6 and a Citroen C4 XS, the French car expels 13 grams less in CO2 emissions, but when the new tax laws are introduced, the Citroen will cost almost AU$200 less to register. I daren’t mention the funky and frugal MINI John Cooper Works again (6.9l/100km, 165 g/km), but, well I just did.

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Motor Shows

2008 Goodwood Festival of Speed – image gallery

Goodwood Festival of Speed 2008

I just stumbled across this excellent image gallery (54photography.com) from the 2008 Goodwood Festival of Speed. Put the kettle on, set aside a 10 minutes or so and enjoy the slideshow. There’s some fantastic images in there, covering a big variety of cars. This gallery certainly brings home just how big the FoS has become, with manufacturers clearly treating the event very seriously. The old skool F1 cars towards the end are well worth the wait, and bring back some great memories.

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News

2008 Goodwood Festival of Speed

2008 Goodwood Fesitval of Speed - Mazda FuraiLast weekend the Duke of Richmond opened up his estate once again for the 18th consecutive Goodwood Festival of Speed. The lads from CarAdvice.com.au were there, check out their report, with heaps of great up close pictures, HERE.

For more info on the Goodwood FoS check out the Wikipedia page. This preview article from the Telegraph also paints a picture of just how big this event is. Enjoy!