TMW - LIVE FROM GOODWOOD (well almost) DAY 2

Again, apologies for the fact that this report is a little late, issues with the ipad and connectivity meant that all the info and pictures i posted as the days wore on, was lost and i have had to re-create it again, but it gives me the pleasure of looking at the near 400 pictures and relive the events of the best weekend at Goodwood yet.

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Day two, and with our grateful thanks to Ford, we had a chauffeur take us from our parked car into the site, it saved about 20 minutes walking and in the Kuga, we had a reasonably comfortable drive, well, until half way there we realised that the access tickets were still in the car, DOH !, so ten minutes later we were back on site and on our way to another great day.

I forgot to add on day one, that as we were leaving, we were greeted by the McLaren P1, now, were not sure if it had broken down, but it suddenly stopped and the driver got out and got on his phone, within minutes the car was swarming with people, but as were were already there we got a some good pictures, so enjoy those, before i do start on day two.

Is that not a beautiful car, more on McLaren later, but we will start with Mazda, the company is riding high on the crest of a very large wave of late, all of its products have either been replaced or refreshed or about to be, and sales are really flying, the Mazda 3 and Mazda6 are doing really well, as is the CX-5, the Mazda2 and MX-5 are not far from new models, and with the concept of the Mazda2 on display here, and if it comes out like this, then sales will continue to grow.

 And then to Volvo, where we had a little wait for the #bravethestorm experience, and it was so hot outside, once we got into the box, which had a Volvo XC60 inside, it was so cool, it was lovely, the point of the #bravethestorm exhibit was to show you that through sensors the car can detect people in front of the car, they did this by having the sensors in the roof of the building, and then making it rain, as you walked about the sensors picked up where you were going, and stopped the rain so you never got wet, well, not entirely, it was good, and it worked, however it is not a new thing, as I drove a Jaguar XFR in 2009 with the same system.

We though then, and reported it on this blog, that we felt it was dangerous, as the car would brake on its own, no advance warning, so anything could happen, if you were driving you could avid the bike by swerving, whereas the car would just brake, it could mean that another car would pile into the back of you, which was what nearly happened, it was frightening and unnerving that the car did this, you just felt as though your not in control.

Also, during the initial introduction we were in the XC60 reading text in the wall, and again Volvo have mentioned the Vision 2020, whereas Volvo would like us to believe they would like to have no deaths or serious injuries in a Volvo, OK, I asked about that, as it is a very bold statement to make, and one that I can not ever see happening, yes you can have a car so full of sensors and safety equipment that it will do its utmost to avoid any incidents, but you cant account for what other people do, or if you have a driver that wants to do harm, maybe this should be looked at again, and maybe adjusted, to state that the cars will do whatever they can to avoid all low speed impacts, that might be more believable, but i applaud Volvo for trying.

Yes, that is us, in the Volvo exhibit, NOT, getting too wet. and it was so cool in there we didn't want to leave.

The AA or Automobile Association has been around for nearly 110 years, and during that time they have assisted millions of drivers, and this year, was the first year that The AA has taken part in GFoS, and WOW, what a start, the AA will now become a major part of all GFoS and Goodwood Revival meetings for years to come, the display of classic AA vehicles was amazing, from Motorbikes, to trucks, Land Rovers to vans, all from many era's.

The AA stand was also THE place to go to, with free bottles of ice cold water, Free Ice Creams, many other giveaways and competitions, and we won, YAY, we never win anything as a rule, and we won, a Millican bag, not sure what that means, but apparently they are about £100 a pop, so it will be used as a laptop bag, so that was a really nice surprise, maybe we could win the VW Camper as well, but then that would be greedy wouldn't it.

The AA stand was brilliant, the guys on their were so happy to talk about the classics, they are looked after by themselves, not in a museum, and all in their own time, that's just so great, that they actually do this, each car, is genuinely an old AA vehicle, located, checked with company records and then put back into A1 order, they did say that they do not have any Transit vans on the classic fleet, so if you do know of a transit that was originally an AA fleet vehicle, please contact me or them and see how it can be placed back into full AA trim and used for these sorts of events.

Another pass by the Citroen stand and a few more pics of the funky looking C4 Cactus and the new C1, this time in bright sunshine they look even better, the C1 being part of the Triplets, 108, Aygo and Citroen.

It was now time to pop over the other side of the track to see what was going on there, the stunning Mercedes Structure that we over the house with two racing cars on is nice, but not the best structure, I think that goes to the Land Rover one from a couple of years back

2008 Land Rover sculpture, my favourite of all time.

And as we passed there we happened to see Mark Webber having some lunch, i feel so sorry for Mark and all the others here, the behaviour of these people was disgusting, shouting and screaming, waving books and pens, we, well we just took a picture from a short distance away, no hassles or inconveniences, yet others were behaving like animals.

Whilst waiting for the drivers to appear at the other side, everyone was waiting for Lewis Hamilton, i cant recall how many times the stewards and security forced the crowds back to that he could get through to his car, yet as soon as they made room, these idiots just barged back, I was nearly knocked down by some prat that grabbed his child and forced him through the crowd to get an autograph, even though everyone had been told there would be no autographs, you could clearly see that Lewis looked quite, not scared, but really not at ease with it.

As you can see from picture 4 above, Lewis was covering his face, and looked not too happy, added to this was the noise, it just got louder and louder, screaming people, and one guy who must have been in his 40's or older, was just running back and forth like a rabid rottweiler, with his F1 team gear on, and autograph book in hand, he looked like an idiot and behaved equally so, just barging people out of his way, he hit me once, and i saw him coming for me again so side stepped him, you can be sure that if hie did it again, i would have whacked him hard with my walking stick, it made me so angry that these people just assume they are entitled to behave this way, next time we go, there will be no one hit limit, push me, and you'll get a whack, end of.

Time was now winding away quickly so it was a bit of a mad dash to get around the rest of the exhibits, The Cartier Style De Luxe and Supercar Paddock will re produced in separate blog posts, but be assured there are a lot of brilliant cars in those sections. Maserati this year was in the courtyard, with a wild new Alfieri Concept sports car, the Ghibli and Quattroporte saloons, along with some stunning classic Maserati's.

 Some really stunning cars here, and it goes to show that classic Italian cars are alive and well, but will they ever get back to the stunning GT cars of yesteryear, I doubt it, very much so, these were from an era when cars like these ruled the roads, they had an aura about them that cars do not have today, you knew that whoever was in one of these cars was special, a celebrity or royalty, now, the Z-List celebs from crappy reality shows get ear vast sums for behaving like gormless idiots and get to own these sorts of cars, and that's a shame, as the mystique has been lost, and lost forever.

Time was now not on our side, so a very quick trip around the F1 stands, seeing the cars from differing era's but all in great condition and all ready to take on the hill climb at full chat, enjoy the pictures, there are a number of cars used by, probably one of the best F1 drivers that ever lived, Ayrton Senna De Silva, and the truly classic John Player Special Black and Gold Lotus, probably the best known, by looks, of any classic F1 car ever.

It's not quite over yet, as we stopped at one more stand, the Land Rover stand, where were greeted with the very first Discovery, and the XXV special edition Discovery 4 (LR4), along with many Range Rovers, Defenders, a lone Freelander 2 (LR2) and the star of the LR stand, the new Discovery Vision concept, the new look of the new Discovery family, I was earwigging with one lady giving one of the staff some grief about getting rd of the Freelander name, for which i fully agree.

She was not happy about the fact that Discovery was going to be used as a name brand like Range Rover and Land Rover, and i am still not to impressed at the fact that they have removed the base models, so now the cheapest is heading towards £30k, I just hope that they have not taken the wrong decision and will price themselves out of sales, because there is no way a lot of people can justify that sort of price, yet £23k-£25k is probably OK, and also the staff member stated that the Freelander would stop production at the end of the year, but they will have built enough to have stocks right through to the end of next year, I can assure you that i would not wish to have a 12 month old vehicle which has been sitting around in a field somewhere.

Here are our pictures of the new Discovery Vision, and thank you for taking the time to the blogs for the GFoS weekend, and remember, if you use any of my pictures for your own use, please do me the courtesy of linking them back to here, or an acknowledgement would be nice.

And it was back to our Chauffeur to take us back to the car, and it was the end of another great motoring event, Lord March works very hard every year, so that, the general public can take part, and get up close and personal with cars and drivers alike, and each year it gets bigger and better, but how can it get any bigger than this year, the manufacturers stands are huge now, and can only get bigger and better, the lack of land, and there is a lot of it, means that there is not very much space left for other brands to appear, and it would be nice for other brands to appear, so who was missing, well, FIAT, MG, Vauxhall, Hyundai, Kia, Lexus, Jeep and Ssangyong, all not in attendance, for some its easy to understand, but Vauxhall and MG, really, British Brands not attending the biggest motoring event of the year, thats just very sad.

TMW - Jon Mower