The cars that starred at the Goodwood Members’ Meeting

The Goodwood Members’ Meeting is one of the early highlights of the historic motorsport season.

The April event caters for sportscars, touring cars and single-seaters, ranging from the earliest days of the automobile to current machinery.

As well as the superb racing and star cars, the 82nd MM also featured some special displays and demonstrations. Here are our highlights.

Special Senna Lotus on track

The Lotus-Renault 97T in which Ayrton Senna scored his first world championship grand prix victory was demonstrated on both days by the Brazilian’s nephew Bruno Senna. Senna Sr took his first Formula 1 pole at the 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix at Estoril and then won the appallingly wet race by more than a minute in 97T/2.

“In qualifying those cars were like dragsters,” recalled ex-F1 racer John Watson, pointing out that in qualifying trim the 1985 turbocars produced well over 1000bhp. “It was knife-edge all the way.

“I remember watching Ayrton on the limit and he had such confidence in that Gerard Ducarouge-designed car. Ayrton was just a force.”

INSIGHT: Ayrton Senna’s 10 greatest F1 drives 

Brundle’s BMW take two

Alex Brundle retraced his family racing history by co-driving Darren Fielding’s BMW 323i in which his father Martin, then 21, won the Tom Walkinshaw Racing-promoted 1980 County Championship for Norfolk.

A roadburner with later owners, the long-dormant car was snapped up by BMW fanatic Fielding at auction last year. Superbly restored by Arran Moulton-Smith’s Amspeed Racing team in the colours of King’s Lynn dealer Sorensons, it started sixth and finished a rorty seventh first time out in the inaugural Win Percy Trophy race for 1970-82 Group 1 saloons of under 2.8 litres.

Jordan tops inaugural GT3 shootout

Modern GT3 cars joined far older machines on track

Photo by: Gary Hawkins

Goodwood celebrated the successful GT3 category with both a demonstration and a shootout. 

There were two practice sessions, plus a qualifying run to set the order for the one-car-at-a-time shootout on Sunday, slowest qualifier going first. All cars ran on wet tyres despite the dry conditions.

Andrew Jordan had topped every session in his 2012 Chevrolet Corvette Z06.R. Going last in the final, he had 1m14.740s to beat, set by Phil Keen in an ex-Tomy Drissi Aston Martin V12 Vantage. Jordan set three purple sectors on his way to victory with 1m13.618s, the only sub-1m14s GT3 lap of the weekend.

“That was about as quick as I could drive that,” said the 2013 British Touring Car champion. “I got a really nice feeling on the out-lap. It’s really quick – I don’t think I took a breath!”

Behind Keen were Andy Priaulx (BMW Z4), Jake Hill (Ferrari 458 Italia), Andre Lotterer (Porsche 911 GT3-R Evo) and Rob Huff (Audi R8 LMS ultra).

Ford boss shares GT40 with Brundle

Farley says events like Goodwood are important for motorsport industry

Photo by: Gary Hawkins

Ford CEO Jim Farley shared Alex Brundle’s Ford GT40 in Saturday evening’s Gurney Cup for sports-prototypes that raced between 1963 and 1967.

Farley started seventh and was running just outside the top 10 when the red flags flew following a crash for Christian Albrecht’s GT40, which lost a wheel. Brundle jumped in for the restart and brought the V8 through to sixth, one of five GT40s in the top seven.

“There’s an extra dynamic to driving well here,” said Farley. “Events like Goodwood are part of the fabric of our industry. Goodwood matters.”

Jota celebrates 25th birthday

Current Jota Cadillac LMDh machine completed high-speed laps

Photo by: Richard Styles

Jota Sport kicked off its 25th birthday celebrations with a display in the Goodwood paddock and on-track demonstrations of one of its 2025 factory Cadillac V-Series.Rs from the World Endurance Championship.

“I’m trying to go fast enough to make it look proper,” said regular WEC racer Alex Lynn, who shared driving duties with Will Stevens. “You know what it’s like when you get in the zone…”

The 5.5-litre V8-powered LMDh Hypercar was unofficially clocked around the 1m06s mark during Stevens’ run on Sunday. The best race lap of the weekend was Frank Stippler’s 1m20.136s on his way to Gurney Cup victory in a Ferrari 206S.

As well as an array of trophies, Jota’s paddock display included its 2005 Zytek 04S, 2014 Gibson Z11SN, 2016 Gibson 015S, 2017 and 2022 versions of LMP2 Le Mans class-winning ORECA-Gibson 07s and last year’s Porsche 963.

Lister-Chevrolet BHL 124 joins the fray

The Lister has a storied history

Photo by: Richard Styles

Unmissable in period Kelly Green colours, the first Lister chassis to be configured – rather than adapted – for Chevrolet V8 power, BHL 124 was commissioned by Tom Carstens of Tacoma, Washington.

Carstens won the Sports Car Club of America’s North West division title in 1959 and subsequent owners Lew Florence and Stan Bennett grew its CV until 1964.

Last raced in historic events by Bill Binnie, the car was reimported last October. Following CKL Developments’ total restoration, it arrived untested, and a diff issue forced Shaun Lynn’s son Max’s Salvadori Cup retirement.  

Aston Martin Ulsters together

Pre-war Astons continue to turn heads

Photo by: Richard Styles

Now 90 years old, the fabled 1500cc Aston Martin Ulsters continue to impress against contemporaries in historic sportscar races with peppy four-cylinder engines and lithe chassis that punched above their weight in period.

Nick Mason’s Ten Tenths equipe has fielded this pair for decades. Currently enjoyed by Nick’s daughters, Holly in LM18 (car number 5) overtook Chloe in LM17 in the Earl Howe race for British-built pre-Second World War sportscars, finishing 19th and 20th overall respectively.

Anna Getley incidentally won Coupe des Dames honours, placing 13th in a supercharged Bentley 4½.