For some, the highlight of the Goodwood Revival will be the variety of gorgeous sports racers making up the grids of the Stirling Moss, Sussex, Freddie March and Whitsun Trophies, as well as the Madgwick Cup and RAC TT. From howling V12 Ferraris to thumping V8 Cobras, to tiny little MGs, here is a list of sportscars not to miss at the 2022 Revival.
We open with a big one, a sight rarely seen, even at the Revival these days. A Ferrari 250 Lusso will be racing, alongside its often-seen Short Wheel Base siblings. The Lusso is longer, curvier, statelier and honestly, a touch out of place in a competition context, but we can’t wait to see it stoke its gorgeous Colombo V12 and bend its sidewalls round our Motor Circuit. You can catch it, among SWBs, E-types, Cobras and more, in the Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy.
We're used to seeing Maserati A6GCSs on the grid at the Goodwood Revival but it’s a point of note when they make up more than 15 per cent of the grid. Yes, four of them will be battling in the Madgwick Cup against Tojeiros, Coopers, Porsches and more. These are beautiful little cars that are plainly popular among historic racers which in period took on Le Mans, the Mille Miglia and more. Today, alongside the Jaguar E-type and the AC Cobra, they’re an almost quintessential sight at the Goodwood Revival.
Featuring in our incredible Ferrari demonstration, celebrating 75 years of the world’s most famous super, sports and racing car marque, is the Ferrari 857S. A predecessor to the Monza, the 857 featured the largest displacement four-cylinder engine yet fitted to a Ferrari sportscar at the time of its debut, with a total of 3.4-litres, or 857cc per cylinder. The Scaglietti-bodied machine became a proven winner, with World Championship victories in 1952 and 1953. The car in the demo is a late 1955 factory works car, that will be a truly special site to see.
You know the score with MGBs. They’re the entry-level classic and, indeed, the entry-level historic racer and they have been for decades. They’re the typical ‘old man fancies an old car on a budget’ choice, without which no summer pub car park or village fete would be complete. As a result of this ‘part of the furniture’ reputation, they often get rather overlooked. Well, at the Revival, on the MGB’s 60th birthday, we’re celebrating with a race dedicated to them. Yes, this year’s Lavant Cup will be an MGB one-maker and judging by some of the battles we’ve seen between our friends Ed Foster and Josh Barnett, it should be absolutely awesome. So we’d suggest, look out for Ed’s and Josh’s cars in the race, in red and duck egg blue, numbered 217 and 90 respectively.
From the faintly conventional, to the entirely weird, the Rover-BRM is a turbine-powered racing car famously driven by Graham Hill at Le Mans. Such is the condition of its presence at Revival 2022, in the Graham Hill celebratory display. Hill described driving it for the first time saying “you’re sitting in this thing that you might call a motor car and the next minute it sounds as if you’ve got a [Boeing] 707 just behind you, about to suck you up and devour you”. This one should be fun to see. Just, whoever's behind it, don’t get too close…
Cobras are no strange sight at the Goodwood Revival but they’re normally thumping around the Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy or the RAC TT Celebration. Rare is it to say that a Cobra could be out of its depth, but the one racing in the Whitsun Trophy this year just might be. In amongst the big-banger open-top Lolas and McLarens and alongside the GT40s, will be a 7.0-litre AC Cobra with none other than Goodwood regular Bill Shepherd. It’s in with a fighting chance at least, then.
Finally, one significant to Goodwood. We’ve a Goodwood 9 Hours-winning Aston Martin DB3 up for grabs in the Bonhams sale this year but on track, we’ll have the third-placing DB3S from 1955. It’ll be battling it out in the Freddie March Memorial Trophy alongside Frazer Nashes, Coopers, Connoughts, Jaguars, Ferraris and more. What sportscar are you most looking forward to seeing at the 2022 Goodwood Revival? Let us know.
Main image courtesy of Motorsport Images. Goodwood photography by Drew Gibson, Michal Popisil and Nick Dungan.
Revival
Revival 2022
Sportscars
Ferrari
250 Lusso
857S
Maserati
A6GCS
MG
MGB
Rover-BRM
AC
Cobra
Aston Martin
DB3S