Remembering Goodwood’s heroes at 78th Members' Meeting

A year and a half after it was originally scheduled, this weekend’s 78th Goodwood Members’ Meeting honours key figures from the circuit’s history, including the likes of Stirling Moss, Dan Gurney and Gerry Marshall

Marcus Pye Oct 14, 2021, 10:23 AM

More akin to school sports days than the Olympics in Goodwood’s first heyday – from the first in August 1949 to the 71st in July 1966, after which it closed to racing – the British Automobile Racing Club’s second-tier Members’ Meetings contrasted with the international events, being aimed at enthusiastic amateurs rather than established racers.

Many competitors went on to far greater things, but for a great many weekend warriors they provided fun in cars driven to the Duke of Richmond & Gordon’s motor circuit on the fringes of historic Chichester, 80 miles south-west of London.

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Author Marcus Pye

Raised initially within earshot of South London’s fabled Crystal Palace circuit, racing engines are the soundtrack to my life. Car enthusiast Dad and godfather took me to British Grands Prix of the 1960s, which sowed the seeds of my passion. Reading Autosport every Thursday morning, following my hero Ronnie Peterson’s exploits, fuelled it.

Volunteering as a BARC junior at Thruxton in the mid-'70s led to lap-charting for commentator Simon Taylor, Autosport's publisher, and grid/pit marshalling. Landed my dream Autosport job aged 19 in July 1977, working under legendary editor Quentin Spurring and Robin Bradford. A staffer for 20 years (1000 issues!), freelance since 1997, I’m its longest-serving writer.

Over 45 seasons I have reported 1200-plus events - covering F2, F3000, F3, club and Historic racing to hillclimbs and sprints at towards 100 venues - and commentated worldwide, most notably at Goodwood and the Spa Six Hours.

My driving CV lists almost 550 competition cars spanning 140 plus marques. Since 1981 I’ve contested over 200 events, from Brands Hatch to Daytona, scoring the occasional result. Co-owning and racing the Chevron B40 in which Keke Rosberg won Enna-Pergusa’s European F2 round the weekend after I joined Autosport and an F5000 Lola T332 were special!

A lottery windfall would see me buy a Chevron B8 (my favourite car from boyhood), Lola T294 and March 782 - and expand my racing sticker archive, popular on Facebook. Beyond the sport and family, my abiding interest is classical music.