As well as claiming to host the biggest gathering of classic cars in the world, the Silverstone Classic also lays claim to being the biggest historic race meeting on the planet, at least in terms of number of cars, drivers and races, if not necessarily in terms of the quality of those competitors, where I think the Goodwood Revival might have the edge.
However, this barely matters, for with a schedule of 21 races featuring 662 cars (I counted them so you don’t have to) spread over the weekend, there was plenty of track action to please everyone, and if you want to know who won what, you can find out here.
Friday was dedicated to practice for all the events – I had originally planned to attend that day but the weather was terrible, and watching the livestream you could see how bad the conditions were. However, as it turned out, it was good preparation for at least half the actual races, since they took place in some very wet and treacherous conditions over the next two days.
21 races were crammed into Saturday and Sunday, starting with Historic Formula Junior and ending with the Classic Mini Challenge. In between, pre-66 GT cars, pre-’66 Grand Prix cars, Thundersports, Touring cars and more took to the track in very variable and occasionally treacherous conditions.
One of the joys of The Classic is that access to the grandstands and paddocks is free, so you can wander in and out of the garages while mechanics work feverishly to prepare their classic racing machines for their drivers, and they seem to be able to do so without losing focus while spectators wander about – at a respectful distance, I have to say – their place of work. Tyres, body panels, exhausts, engine parts lie scattered about and every now and then the ear-splitting din of a race-tuned engine causes everyone to cover their ears and yet at the same time, wander over to the source of that sound like bees to a honeypot. It’s a petrol-head’s idea of heaven.
For me, the most evocative cars are the pre-’66 GT cars, the Touring cars, and the Grand Prix machines, but of course there’s something for just about every middle-aged child at an event like this. Who could fail to be enthralled by not one, but four Maserati 250F’s, a Lola T70, the glorious failure that was the 1976 six-wheeled Tyrell, a Williams FW07, a Ford GT40, and more and more…
With so much happening all around the track and paddocks, this can only be a very superficial overview of what went on over the weekend. For me, there was as much excitement in wandering through the paddocks, watching cars stream through the paddock onto the circuit – the Historic F1 cars made an awesome sound – and standing near the pit lane as cars came in for driver switches in the longer races. I did venture up in the stands a couple of times, but too far away from the action to take any decent photographs.
Sunday morning was especially damp, and it was during this period that the Formula Jumior, Touring Cars and Historic Formula 2 machines took to the track. I have to say that despite the weather, there was little holding back from the majority of the drivers, with some very brave overtaking at the end of the Wellington Straight in particular.
Thankfully, the weather improved over the afternoon and the Historic F1 cars were able to go at it full on, at the same time as their present-day counterparts were engaged in a chaotic Hungarian Grand Prix – I wonder if we’ll be looking back on today’s F1 cars with the same reverence in 20-30 years’ time? I’m not so sure, and I for one definitely don’t see todays Le Mans sports prototypes as engaging at all compared to their equivalents of the ‘60’s, and ‘70’s, but maybe I’m just biased, maybe it’s just the nostalgia talking. Besides the aforementioned Tyrell, a pair of McLarens – an MP4 and an MP29 – and a 1982 Lotus 91 in JPS colours stole the show for me.
The RAC Woodcote and Stirling Moss Trophies attracted some utterly fabulous machinery – Jaguar C and D-types, a Ferrari 250TR, various incredibly low-slung Lotuses, and a glorious Maserati A6GCS among others, and over with the touring cars you could find the fabulous Ford Capri’s and BMW 3.0CSL’s that used to do battle back in the 1970’s, Rover Vitesse’s, and what must have been an unlikely track car even then, a Volvo 242.
Among the pre-’63 GT cars there was much to drool over – a delightful, delicate Alfa Romeo SZ, comparatively brutish Aston Martin DB2’s, and moving forward just three years to the pre-’66 class, a stunning blue Aston DP214 wearing the appropriate race number was perhaps the stand-out, and it was a treat to see a Morgan SLR again.
I’m not going to attempt to pick out highlights from each of the 21 categories – I think it’s fair to say that The Classic is a gigantic buffet for the eyes and ears, almost too much so – but even if you miss some events or cars, there’s so much to see that you’ll still have seen plenty. Check out the gallery below for just some fabulous racing classics from this year’s event, and roll on next year, hopefully with better weather!
