The first ever Goodwood SpeedWeek was held this year at the renowned Goodwood Motor circuit. Combining the best elements of the Festival of Speed Goodwood Revival and the annual Member's Meeting, the event took place 16th - 18th October.
It promised to be the extravaganza that would fill the gap in the Motorsport calendar and for ADP Classic Racing supporting DK Engineering at the event, this promise was fulfilled. Due to the current restrictions, the event was sadly held behind closed doors, but spectators had the opportunity to see the live action as it was broadcast to a world audience via live stream and various social media channels, presented by Dermot O'Leary, Mark Webber, Sian Welby and Rory Reid. The extra space created, allowed a prestigious format to be planned with a wider variety of cars, new tech, launches and demos - providing a spectacular world class event, as always at Goodwood.
Following extensive restorations of the famous Huffaker E Type, a period competition race car and the iconic ex Ecurie Ecosse 1959 Tojeiro Jaguar, by the team at ADP Classic Racing, we were excited and privileged to be supporting these distinctive cars in the Goodwood SpeedWeek and to also support, the Scuderia Bear Ford GT40.
Chris Ward Operations Manager explains how, for ADP, the 3 day festival unfolded: "Instead of the normal Revival format where drivers qualify on the Friday, followed by the regular Friday evening Kinrara Trophy, and racing on Saturday and Sunday, due to the current restrictions we had an extremely busy weekend, with qualifying and racing taking place on the same day for all three cars, two on the Saturday and the Tojeiro on the Sunday... We arrived on Friday in preparation for a full on assault on Saturday, with our first qualifying session taking place at 8.00am with the E-Type, followed by the GT40 qualifying immediately after the E Type.
The first race for us was the Whitsun Trophy - a 25-minute race for sports prototypes built between 1961 and 1966. This gave us an opportunity to support the most famous example of these contenders - the Ford GT40. James scooped a 3rd place which was an amazing start to the racing.
The second race for us, was the Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy, which officially became the new name for the former Kinrara Trophy. The race started with a moving ceremony paying tribute to Sir Stirling Moss, an "absolute gentleman who will be sorely missed" with Marc Knopfler performing "Going Home from his album” "Local Hero". This strongly contested trophy was the prize we had set our sights on and the Huffaker
E-Type did not disappoint, in fact this race was the highlight for ADP. Things began well, Harvey started the car and he immediately popped himself into 2nd place and was following Gary Pearson, who was also driving an E-Type and the two of them maintained station through the initial part of the race. Harvey drove extremely well, he has been getting better and better over the last few months with the testing we have been doing etc, but he just had such a level head to maintain pace behind Gary. Gary, is the most winning driver at the Goodwood Revival, and he is a Jaguar specialist too, so to be able to maintain pace with Gary and to start to hassle him was excellent.
Then, there was the unfortunate race incident - The two E-types started to lap the field and heading out of Fordwater corner, a gaggle of cars were ahead. Gary chose to overtake a Lotus Elite. When he started the manoeuvre - there was a gap. When he got side by side with the Elite, that gap closed - the driver of the Elite just didn't see Gary. There was an unfortunate contact which sent the Elite off, the Elite also collected a Ferrari. That put Gary out of the race - a real shame as he is one of the most considerate drivers out there. At that same moment - I was going to bring Harvey in for the pit stop to change over to James, but, we saw the safety car boards and Harvey appeared in 1st place, behind the Safety Car; you cannot pit behind the Safety Car at Goodwood. The pit lane at Goodwood is very small and very tight in comparison to other circuits, so you have got to be careful when you bring drivers in, because it gets very congested. This year there is the added problem of carrying out the sanitisation routine between driver changeover and because of COVID only one person was able to work on the car at any one time. So it was a 2 minute pit stop and timing is critical. You could end up queuing behind somebody who decided to wait at the end of the pit lane to see out their 2 minutes pit stop. So, we decided to leave it until the very last moment in the hope that everybody else would have got their change out of the way, leaving us an empty pit lane, giving us more time and more space.
All went to plan and it worked extremely well, James went out and started his stint and he drove exceptionally. For the last 5 laps James was being caught by Ex World Touring Car Champion Rob Huff, who was getting closer and closer - until he was within a second. With headlights continually in his mirror, James had to compromise his racing line, in order to keep pace and keep Rob behind him. That sort of pressure from somebody who has won the World Touring Car championship is tough and James drove phenomenally well and brought the car home in that 1st position. Fantastic""
Supporting DK Engineering at the first Goodwood Speed Week was extraordinary for ADP. We completed a bare metal restoration on this car and knowing that we prepared it to such a standard that enabled the car to win this prestigious event, only its 2nd race since the car was built, is a real accolade and testament to all of the engineers that worked on the car.
A victory in a thrilling race and becoming inaugural winners of the Stirling Moss Memorial trophy in 2020 - is an honour.
On the Sunday, James was out again, driving the Tojeiro in the Lavant Cup. The Tojeiro had also been subject to a bare chassis and meticulous re-build and James qualified the Tojeiro in 2nd place, lapping in a 1 minute 26.99, 2/10ths of a second faster than he had achieved previously. James successfully held on to second, tracking down the leader throughout the race, to finish under one second behind and completing his fastest lap of the race, 1 minute 25.99 on his very last lap, a further full second faster than his previous fastest lap. This rounded out the hat-trick for this incredible festival.
We are incredibly fortunate to have such a passionate and enthusiastic engineering team at Classic Racing which made this possible.