Video: Jake Hill’s incredible Can-Am run at Festival of Speed

18th July 2024

Simon Ostler

We’ve enjoyed an awful lot of Can-Am related content at Goodwood so far in 2024. In the wake of the 81st Members' Meeting demonstrations that threatened to leave us all with permanent hearing damage, the Shadows were back at the Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard in an effort to finish the job.

No fewer than five Shadow Can-Am cars were in action on the Goodwood Hill over the course of the weekend, each making a savage amount of noise courtesy of their big-block Chevrolet V8s with trumpets jutting straight out of the top.

Couple that with extremely talented drivers like current BTCC points-leader Jake Hill and you have a potent mix that is guaranteed to entertain. The show begins almost instantly as he powers into an eye-opening burnout that threatens to send him completely sideways. Traction is finally achieved only just in time for the entrance to the first turn.

Hill puts his foot to the floor again to light up the rear tyres and send it squirrelling past the House and up towards Molecomb. It’s one of the most spectacular starts to a Festival of Speed hillclimb run we’ve ever seen.

The look of this Shadow Mk1 is equally nuts. If you’ve ever stood next to one of these, you’ll know just how low to the ground they are. The bodywork reaches to barely knee height, which makes the massive rear wing, that also houses the radiators in the Mk1, look utterly ridiculous.

We’re so glad this period of near-limitless motorsport existed. These Can-Am cars are truly unique, and to see them in action, especially when driven with quite such gusto, is a genuine treat.