What makes wood good?

The answer to that question is as follows:

• Fast Cars
• Rally Racing
• Hill Climbs

Today I went with some friends to the 2009 Festival of Speed at the Goodwood Estate in West Sussex, UK. It was an extravaganza of all things motor sport. After a 8hr drive (damn traffic) down from Ulverston to Weybridge, on Friday, Pete, Mel and I woke up on a fine July 4th Saturday and headed down to the festival. I had planned to meet Mike Coutant and his dad down there.

Pete, Mel and Mike

Once we got there I was amazed at the scale of the festival. It was huge and had just about anything that a car lover would want. There were booths for major auto makers, hill climb races, forest rally racing and everything in between. After a bite to eat we walked around for a while and checked out some of the booths, watched some hill climb racing and then we met up with Mike and his dad.

Around the Festival

We then walked up to the rally stage and checked out the rally cars as they barreled through the woods at high rates of speed. Once we got done with that we headed to the rally racing paddock where the cars that we watched were sitting awaiting their next run.

Mini Cooper Rally Car

We even got to see Peter Fonda ride the bike he rode in the movie "Easy Rider" up the hill climb course.

Peter Fonda on the Left

The rest of the pictures are here.