The Goodwood Revival Meeting is a popular annual motor racing event many classic car enthusiasts thoroughly enjoy for its mouthwatering cars, breathtaking driving on the track and the wonderful period feel of a race meeting with a mid 1960s ambiance. That period feel - "a magical step back in time" - is from a combination of the pre mid-sixties cars on and off the track and also the willingness of most people attending to dress in a style and in clothing of the period. In fact it's a good opportunity to chase out the moth from an old and much loved sports jacket! Well over recent years a group of V8 enthusiasts have met up over the three days and shared a stroll around the circuit and paddock and watched practice and the racing. The sight of Mk 7 Jaguars leaning into the bends, Astons and Ferrari 250LMs drifting through Fordwater and the growl of the Cobras are simply wonderful.

The air displays with Spitfires, Hurricanes and Mustangs are a joy to see and hear together with the fly past of a Lancaster.

The event is an extraordinary experience as it as alive and real as the race meetings at Goodwood before the circuit closed back in the mid sixties. The cars are raced with serious effort by modern classic sportscar drivers (like the V8 Register members David Franklin in a Ferrari 250LM and Ron Gammons in a Lotus 19) and by many racing heroes from the past like Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham and Tony Brooks. We even have V8 Register member Barry Sidery-Smith out in his MGB - he is both a relic from sportscar racing in sixties and someone who is still actively racing today! The attention to detail by Lord March's team is truly extraordinary too - little touches that contribute to a wonderfully complete re-creation of an earlier age of motor sport with a relaxed feel and an underlying sense of style and fun. More


The sight of a full grid racing down to Madgwick Corner is a wonderful. What a delight to see historic cars driven with vigour and not just standing in dusty museums! (Photo: Goodwood Circuit)

V8 enthusiasts at the Goodwood Revival meeting
Well for the Goodwood Revival 2013 we are continuing the informal V8 Gathering. John Targett will be over from Akron Ohio and regulars like Mike and Phylida Maude-Roxby, Bryan Ditchman, Howard Gosling, Jim Gibson and Sue Walker, Ken Willis, Peter Kuruber, Ron and Valerie Gammons and Victor Smith will be there.

Do get in touch with Victor Smith on 0208 392 9434 beforehand or on 07770 822977 over the Goodwood Revival weekend. There is good mobile phone coverage at the Circuit although often the networks are fully engaged so that getting a connection can be difficult at times!


Getting to Goodwood
In terms of getting to Goodwood, you have two choices based on the direction from which you approach Goodwood Circuit - from the north or from the south - and that will determine the car park you will be directed to, unless you have been allocated a particular car parking sticker by the organisers. Whichever route you decide to take, it is well worth timing your journey to arrive before 8.00am or earlier to avoid the slow moving queues for the car parks. The Goodwood Circuit management are very efficient at handling the car parking traffic flows. You will be directed into one of the public car parks (level grass fields) and parked in rows.

Approaching from the north through Singleton village on the A286 from Midhurst. You can reach Midhurst from the A3 (London-Portsmouth road) at Milford or from Pulborough and Petworth to the east and Winchester from the west on the A272. It's a wonderful drive over the downs passing Goodwood racecourse.

A route to the north east car park from the north of Goodwood (for example if you are coming down from the North, for example from the A3 at Milford) takes you east of Singleton village to East Dean and then south to a crossroads just east of the north east car park. It is available as a PDF download. More

Approaching from the south from the roundabout on the A27. You reach this roundabout from the M27 to the west or from the east on the A27 from Arundel and further east or from the A285 from Petworth or the A29 Pulborough & Billingshurst. Congestion on the A27, even before you reach that roundabout, is legendary, so unless you arrive before 8.00am lengthy delays are likely on the A27 and then once off the roundabout and on the secondary road leading north to Goodwood Circuit (also marked for Goodwood Airfield) there is usually a slow traffic queue until you are directed to one of the public cars parks (see the bottom RH corner of the plan below).


Finding your way around the Circuit
Circuit plan - with the key features for the Revival Race meeting. (Plan: Goodwood Circuit Revival Programme 1998)


Enlarged plan of entrance to the Circuit, grandstands, enclosures and the subway to the paddock. (Plan: Goodwood Revival Programme 1998)

Where to meet up
A convenient meeting place is at the bar and teashop marked "F1" on the plan above which is near the main pedestrian entrance (marked on the plan above) and the pedestrian subway to the Paddock. The Paddock is on the inside of the track. It is a convenient point because it is only 50 yards (45 metres) from the main ticket control point at the head of the path leading from the road passing the entrance to the Circuit. So if you are not familiar with Goodwood all you have to do is walk dead ahead from the ticket control barrier and then you will see the marquee with the bar and teashop diagonally to your left.

On Saturday and Sunday mornings between 8.15am to 9.15am Victor Smith and other V8 enthusiasts are usually to be found at the Spitfire Restuarant, marked "F2" on the plan above enjoying an English breakfast - they will be happy to see you there! The Spitfire Bar overlooks the parked WW2 aircraft which are usually fired up early in the morning - just before 9am - for a short display and then again at lunchtime.

Now just a few notes on dress for the Goodwood Revival meeting
Lord March has very successfully revived motor racing at Goodwood by capturing the style and feel of motor racing as it was in the early 1960s. He has restored the Circuit substantially as it was when it closed for racing in the mid-sixties and he has made quite exceptional efforts in achieving this - he even has haymaking in progress on the inside of the track and the hay set in stoops to dry as it would have been forty years or more ago. This of course adds to the period feel and is a benefit to photographers! The cars on the track are all pre mid-sixties machines, and there are many motor racing personalities from the fifties and sixties present together with current drivers of classic and historic racing and sports cars. But his attention to detail and desire to share the sense of fun he so evidently enjoys in motor racing goes further - he has period props and characters dressed in RAF uniforms and period clothing, not to mention all manner of vehicles from the forties, fifties and sixties. He has aircraft parked up and flying from WW2. There are times as you walk around you feel you are back in the sixties as there are so few signs of later years! Visitors are encouraged to participate too by dressing in a style of the period.

Two Goodwood Revival regulars enjoying the Paddock sights - yes even cheeky schoolgirls from St Trinians! But be assured a St John Ambulance team were on hand nearby with a de-fibrolator! Mike and Bill look as if September 1962 was just yesterday, but how long can they keep the moth at bay!! (Photo: Victor Smith)

Most visitors do dress in sympathy with the style of the event - ladies wear summer dresses, pastel shades and pearls, and even wartime austerity dresses or suits - and men shake out their old sports jackets or blazers, twills, neckwear (a tie, bowtie or cravat) and brogues, together a hat and give the moth a surprise! Some visitors appear in drainpipe trousers and Teddyboy jackets. The period feel is further enhanced by the groups from local drama schools playing various parts from the 1960s - one group last year was a schoolmistress with a class of girls from St Trinians which caused some amusement.

School mistress struggling to control her class from St Trinians - the actors are provided by a local drama school. The attention to detail and sense of fun are hallmarks of the approach Lord March and his team have to re-creating the feel and atmosphere of Goodwood in the 1950s and 60s. (Photo: Victor Smith)

So trainers, baseball caps and modern logo adorned sweatshirts are not at all welcome and only an insensitive few appear in them. To get from the public enclosures into the Paddock on the inside of the track via the pedestrian tunnel (see the plan above), the stewards appear to check both paddock transfers and that visitors are suitably dressed. For photographers in the Paddock it is wonderful because it means the attire of the human backdrop is very much as it would have been when the cars being prepared for the various events were originally competing at the Circuit some 40 years ago or more.


Where to watch the racing and enjoy the sights and sounds
The start line at Goodwood - an impressive sight with Mk 7 & 9 Jaguars, Sunbean Rapiers, A35s, Riley 1.5s and Morris Minors set to give battle again. The view here is from the grandstand on the outside of the Circuit, facing the Pits.

One of the pleasures of attending the Goodwood Revival meeting is a stroll right round the outside of the track with several chums in the morning during practice pausing at the bars on the way for an occasional pint of ale. Do try and get round to Fordwater (a high speed corner on the far side of the Circuit - see the bottom LH side of the plan of the Circuit above) because the sight of an Aston or a Ferrari drifting through, brushing the apex at 130mph is beyond description - not to mention the sound of the engines on full-song! A seat in one of the grandstands during the racing programme is useful and a welcome relief for the legs too! It's also a great benefit if it rains! Another popular spot is a grass covered mound by the chicane on the outside of the track where you get a good view of the cars as they race up from Woodcote Corner to the slowest part of the lap. Spectating from the roof of the pits (see the spectators massed above the pits in the photo above) is another interesting viewpoint particularly during the one hour race when you have the driver changes below in the pits.

Standing on the grass bank at Madgwick Corner is also a very useful viewing point as it is a complex corner with a great deal of action. It is also a good spot for the air display as the aircraft usually follow the line of the main grass runway and pass right over the Madgwick banking!