Goodwood International Meeting

Easter Monday, March 30th.

The main event in the B.A.R.C. Easter holiday programme was the 42-lap Formula One race for £350 and the News of the World Trophy, but before this took place the large crowd around the edges of the Goodwood airfield circuit were treated to a couple of 10-lap races. The first was for Formula Three cars, in which there was a depressing number of non-starters, and Stewart driving Ken Tyrell’s 1964 Cooper-B.M.C. ran away with the event; the spirited driving of Fenning in the Janspeed Engineering Lotus-B.M.C. prevented the race from being a Tyrell/Cooper benefit, for he kept his red car at close quarters with Banks in the second Tyrell car and took second place on the last lap. The second 10-lap race was for saloon cars and provided another runaway victory, this time for Jack Sears in the WilIment-entered Ford Galaxie V8. Brabham was due to challenge the Willment car, driving Alan Brown’s Galaxie, but in practice a tyre deflated going into Madgewick and the vast American car rolled over and over with a crashing and banging, the like of which had never before been heard on the Sussex circuit. It finished up on its wheels rather the worse for wear and Brabham undid his safety harness and stepped out unmarked. Being on his own, Sears “wuffled” round in full command of the race, but in his rear-view mirror was a works Ford Lotus-Cortina, driven by Jim Clark, that was doing some pretty acrobatic balancing acts and keeping up with the big V8. Among the rest of the field a collection of Lotus-Cortinas was led by Arundell, with Frank Gardner in hot pursuit, and a horde of B.M.C. Mini cars pounded round and were embarrassed by a lone Ford Anglia 1200 belonging to Superspeed Conversions and very ably driven by M. Young. The Mini battle was a three-cornered affair between rival “speed-shops,” the Alexander Engineering car finally leading from Downton Engineering, and both vanquishing the works Cooper entries, but that Ford Anglia was ahead of them all!

After these diversions we came to the serious business of the Formula One race, over a full 100 miles distance, and sixteen cars lined up on a dummy grid down near the chicane. In the front row were Brabham with a brand-new 1964 Brabham-Climax V8, basically as last year, but modified to take 13-in. wheels and the new “fat” Dunlops, and having re-positioned radius arms at the rear to make it possible to remove the cylinder heads from the Coventry-Climax V8 engine more easily; the latest 5-speed Hewland gearbox was fitted, and in practice a time of 1 mm. 21.0 sec. had been recorded, which was 1 sec. quicker than the existing lap record. In the centre of the front row was Clark in the Lotus 25B with Climax V8 engine that he had raced at the wet Snetterton meeting, and alongside him, on the outside, was Graham Hill in the second of the 1964 B.R.M. fully stressed-skin cars; with the latest Dunlop-built 13-in, wheels and tyres. This was the car that should have been ready for Ginther for the Snetterton meeting, but as Hill wrecked the first 1964 car at that meeting he took Ginther’s car for Goodwood. The American driver could not get away for this Easter race, so a second B.R.M. was entered for R. Attwood, recently co-opted into the B.R.M. team. The second row of the grid comprised Arundell in the Lotus 25B he raced at Snetterton, and Ireland with the Snetterton-winning B.R.P. monocoque. In practice Ireland had tried out the latest 1964 B.R.P. monocoque car, with B.R.M. V8 engine, B.R.M. 6-speed gearbox and Lotus suspension units, and this new car followed the general principles of the 1963 B.R.P. but with improved methods of construction and even slimmer and tidier lines. The left-band-operated gear-lever worked in a gate that was an integral part of the monocoque construction, the single long control rod running rearwards inside the stressed-skin box of the frame. The suspension had been laid out to take the new 13-in. Lotus wheels and “fat” Dunlop tyres. With Ireland in this car, Trevor Taylor was to drive the 1963 B.R.P. monocoque, but last-minute engine trouble on the new car meant that the drivers “moved down one,” Ireland taking the 1963 car and Taylor taking the team’s Lotus 24-B.R.M. V8. In row three were McLaren and Bonnier with 1963 Coopers, both using Climax V8 engines, and Trevor Taylor, and behind them Attwood in an early B.R.M. V8 which Centro-Sud had last year, and Baghetti in one of the present Centro-Sud cars. The rest of the field consisted of John Taylor in Gerard’s 1964 Cooper F.3 with 1500 Ford engine, Raby with his Brabham-B.R.M. V8, Revson with his Lotus-B.R.M. V8, Collomb (Lows-Climax V8), Pilette (Scirocco-Climax V8), and right at the back was Hailwood with one of the Parnell Lotus 25-B.R.M. V8 cars.

The field moved up on to the proper starting grid, everything was orderly, the flag dropped, and away they went, with Clark snatching a brief lead but Graham Hill was better placed for the first corner and got ahead. The new B.R.M. appeared to be going splendidly and Hill had the measure of Clark, who was followed closely by Ireland and Brabham, but things soon settled down in the order Hill, Clark and Brabham, with Ireland leading the next group, but he was being hard-pressed by Arundell, and McLaren was just behind and watching closely. Another splendid three-cornered dice was developing between Atwood (B.R.M.), Trevor Taylor (Lotus-B.R.M.) and Bonnier (Cooper-Climax), the new B.R.M. team member driving very smoothly and confidently. As far as the first three cars were concerned there seemed a stalemate developing, and while no one was challenging anyone, equally no one had the legs of anyone. In the next trio it was a different state of affairs, for Arundell was obviously thinking he could go faster if Ireland was not in front of him and on the ninth lap he squeezed by, and he, Ireland and McLaren all arrived in a tight bunch and it was Ireland who was caught on the wrong foot! The B.R.P. spun and by sheer mischance it clouted McLaren’s Cooper, which was already taking avoiding action, and the two cars struck the earth bank, the B.R.P. bent about the nose but the Cooper in a sorry state with suspension units broken off front and rear. Neither driver was hurt and as they walked away Arundell re-appeared and as he went by, now safely in fourth place, he looked at the wreckage in mild surprise! A much more tidy trio was Attwood, Taylor and Bonnier, and they swapped positions, each taking a turn at leading, but keeping close station all the time. John Taylor was having a lonely but fast drive, well ahead of the also-rans, but not in sight of the “big boys,” and at the back Baghetti, Raby and Hailwood were having fun together, while Collomb and Pilette seemed almost stationary by comparison.

Around half-distance Clark began to put the pressure on Hill, but though the Lotus was very close to the B.R.M. it seemed unlikely that it was going to get by, especially as they were lapping the slower cars now and Clark was having some busy moments in “closing gaps.” This bid for the lead faded when the Lotus clutch withdrawal mechanism went wrong and Clark could not depress the pedal, so had to make clutchless gear-changes, which caused him to drop back and for Brabham to get by into second place. Hill was now safely on his own and Brabham was just counting the money for a certain second place when his nearside rear wheel rim split and punctured the tyre just as he was “leaning” on it in Madgewick corner. The car spun off and rode up the earth bank, luckily staying upright, and an unscathed but quizzical Brabham stepped out. Bonnier had by now fallen by the wayside and Attwood had settled for a very convincing position just behind Trevor Taylor, and the outcome seemed to be settled, with Hill (B.R.M.) a worthy winner, Clark (Lotus) a sick second, Arundell a lonely third, and Taylor and Attwood fourth and fifth, respectively. As Hill was about to finish his 40th lap the B.R.M. engine suddenly died and he coasted into the pits, the trouble eventually being traced to a broken distributor rotor arm. This, of course, let Clark through into a lucky win, with his team-mate second, followed by Trevor Taylor and Attwood. Of the tail-enders, Collomb had eliminated himself and Bonnier when they both tried to get through the chicane together, others had suffered mechanical derangements, and Hailwood found himself in fifth place, with Pilette bringing up the rear.

The day’s racing concluded with two more races, the first a GT race in which there was an embarrassing moment when it looked as though Willment’s hulking great A.G. Cobra V8, driven by Jack Sears, was going to beat Graham Hill in a 1964 Ferrari GTO, but right prevailed against might and the Ferrari got in front and stayed there, but for the rest of the race Hill could see the Cobra making ugly faces at him in the rear-view mirror and he had to press on to the bitter end. Down the field Arundell and Spence in new competition Lotus Elans were giving Sargent a bad time in his E-type Jaguar, and they eventually got by, causing consternation in Coventry. The final race was for sports cars of all shapes and denominations, and John Coundley ran out a deserved winner in his immaculate Lotus 19 with 4-cylinder 2.7-litre Climax engine, hotly pursued by Stewart in the rather tatty-looking Ecurie Ecosse Cooper-Monaco, who lost the lead when he spun at Woodcote. Highlight of the race was the race-long duel between Brabham in the brand new Brabham BT8 with 1,880-c.c. B.R.M. V8 engine and Lanfranchi in the latest Elva with 1,991-c.c. B.M.W. engine, an Elva improved 1,800-c.c. unit. They finished barely half a second apart in what was one of the best races of the day, but then the R.A.C. Scrutineers tried to spoil it all by proving that the Brabham’s horn didn’t work, or the windscreen-wiper blades were on upside down, or something equally fatuous. It had been a good dice, Brabham had just beaten the Elva, Frank Nicholl’s was delighted with the way his new project had gone, and everyone was happy except the R.A.C.!—D. S. J.

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Goodwood Goodies

Funniest protest of the day came from Slotemaker and his entrant, who claimed that they were baulked by another car that weaved about on the straight in front of them. Hasn’t Daniel Richmond seen Slotemaker driving in National races at Zandvoort?

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Attwood in his first Formula One drive for B.R.M. did not impress; he did exactly what one would expect of this smooth and competent driver. First-class stuff.

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There were to have been some F.2 cars mixed in with the Grand Prix cars but none were ready. The Stirling Moss team ran their Porsche 904 in the sports-car race, driven by Whitmore, but it did not seem outstanding; perhaps the colour had something to do with it. Yet another shade of British Vomit Green!

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The first Lotus 30 sports car, with 4.7-litre Ford V8 engine, should have run in the last race, but it was not ready in time. Ian Walker’s Press news, hand-out claims 200 m.p.h. This we must see.