The Goodwood Festival of Speed once again achieved an outstanding crowd attendance, with 150,000 people joining the 14th anniversary celebrations over the weekend. In spite of the distractions of mixed weather, plus the World Cup and Wimbledon finals, the 50,000 motor sport enthusiasts that arrived at Goodwood House each day of the Festival were treated to some spectacular sights from many of the world’s greatest racing driving and riders.

Festival of Speed first timers Nigel Mansell (plus sons Greg and Leo), Mika Hakkinen, Marcus Gronholm and Richard Petty thrilled the Goodwood spectators, and had a thoroughly good time themselves. Nigel Mansell, for example, said, “It’s great. Lord March has put something special back into motor sport that has been missing for years, I’ve never seen an event like it in the world.” Fellow F1 World Champion Mike Hakkinen summed up the Festival by saying “It’s huge, very impressive, and great fun with so many great drivers and riders.”

Another Festival rookie, DTM Champion Gary Paffett, created the most smoke over the weekend as he spun the rear wheels of his DTM Mercedes-Benz AMG C-Class virtually all the way up the 1.16-mile Goodwood hillclimb course, and went on to be awarded both the dunhill Driver of the Day, and dunhill Future Champion. Fellow Brit Justin Law achieved the most lurid angles on the hill in the Goodwood maintenance van, a standard-looking Ford Transit with an unexpected turn of speed, thanks to its Jaguar XJ220 supercar running gear. Motor cycle legend Randy Mamola also caused much excitement riding the unique two-seater GP Ducati, with his pillion passengers including Lord March, and his daughter Lady Alexandra Gordon Lennox.

Seven contemporary Formula One teams attended the Festival, with the Renault F1 Team creating a memorable aural treat as it ‘played’ ‘God Save the Queen’ and ‘We Are The Champions’ on a current F1 engine, based at the main central display area directly outside Goodwood House. The record number of racing motorcycles and riders tried their very best to create as much noise as the F1 teams, and almost succeeded, although the thunderous F3 Tornado and the Red Arrows air displays, along with the Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 Jumbo Jet fly past drowned them out.

Away from the hillclimb, the new and improved Goodwood Forest Rally Stage gave the authentic flavour of gravel-spitting motor sport, with plenty of sideways action from rally cars old and new, including five current WRC rally teams, and rallying heroes such as Petter Solberg, Colin McRae and Hannu Mikkola.
 

This contrasted with the calm and tranquillity of the Cartier ‘Style et Luxe’, a bastion of serenity where some of the world’s most remarkable automobiles and scooters took part in this prestigious automotive design competition. The Cartier Paddock had two special categories this year, one dedicated to the Lamborghini Miura on the occasion of its 40th anniversary and the other, "Class 8: Roman Holiday - Classic Scooters from the 1950s and 1960s" which was honoured the two biggest names in Italian scooters, the Vespa and Lambretta both of which are celebrating their 60th anniversaries this year.

The Vespa, with its brilliant pressed-steel monocoque designed by aircraft engineer Corradino d'Ascanio, was introduced in 1946 when aircraft maker Piaggio was looking to diversify. The word Vespa is Italian for 'wasp' - the perfect word to describe the scooter's buzzing two-stroke engine note. Meanwhile the first Lambretta prototype was also turned out in 1946. The Innocenti company saw the future of low-cost private transport and this the Lambretta (named after a Milanese river near the factory) was born. Using Innocenti's pre-war experience in producing steel tubing the concept utilised a steel tubular frame and was based around the small, lightweight motorbikes that paratroopers brought with them during the war. Unlike Vespa though, Lambretta ceased building scooters in 1971 although its tiny machines were built under licence in Spain, Chile, Brazil and China at some point.

At Goodwood 14 immaculate examples of these little scooters were on show, provided by Nigel Cox and Dez Askill. The were scattered around a well thought out dedicated area that was filled with Italian symbols: broken pillars and chunky plinths which exuded a real "Roman" feel, with the shape of the machines even cast into these scattered structures. The display of Lambrettas and Vespas adjoined a large display of Lamborghini Miuras, another symbol of Italian excellence and success, providing a graphic demonstration of the power of the Italian automotive industry over the years and its importance at the Festival of Speed this year. The scooters on display in the Cartier 'Style et Luxe' Paddock comprised: Lambretta Model A, Model D Trailer Combination, TV 175 (2 off), SX 200 and GP 200; Vespa 125 'Lowlight', GS 150, GS 160, SS 180, SS 90, Rally 180 and a Douglas Vespa 'Rod Type'.