GRR

This Bugatti Type 35B was a living legend on the Breakfast Club Grid

17th August 2017
Andrew Willis

Just as we thought a gloriously sunny early start for the 2017 Goodwood Breakfast Club Classic Car Sunday couldn’t get any better, one of our all-time favourites swanned in to join the party. 

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Making a fashionably late arrival, this absolutely stunning Bugatti Type 35B was one of the day’s biggest head-turners, making its way up the long Goodwood Circuit start-finish straight, parting the seas of early morning revellers with a very persuasive-sounding 2.3-litre engine.

If you are planning to be a touch on the late side to a classic car event, then this is most definitely the car you want to do it in.

The Bugatti Type 35Bs are quickly becoming a favourite of the GRR office, especially after seeing one rip up the Goodwood Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard Hill climb by Julian Majzub in one of the weekend’s most committed runs.

It opened our eyes to the sheer venom hiding below the beautifully lined bodywork of the Bugatti and also demonstrated that a car designed, built and raced in the 1920s can still cut a line in anger. It genuinely didn’t look out of place amongst its modern competitors, and neither did its Hillclimb time.

Indeed, the Type 35 was an incredibly successful race car in its own era, winning over 1,000 races, including the Grand Prix World Championship in 1926, the Bugatti dominated and regularly smashed lap and course records around Europe.

It’s a triumph of French engineering and, despite its ridiculous, and by no means shy engine sound, the Type 35B manages to deploy a real touch of elegance and class wherever it goes.

It's only when you get up close and personal with the Type 35 that the sheer age of the thing really hits home. It’s a car suspended by leaf springs. An engineering design that wouldn’t be out of place on horse-drawn carriages around the turn of the 18th century. It’s got a hand crank engine-start; drum brakes and a gear lever positioned outside of the car. Almost aeronautical in its body shape, the pug-nosed Bugatti is instantly recognisable and really stood out on the Breakfast Club grid.

Almost as quickly as this beautiful dark navy blue Bugatti arrived, it was gone again from the grid, and like all great party guests, its short and sweet stay only increased our longing to spend more time with it again in the future. 

  • Bugatti

  • type 35

  • Breakfast Club

  • Classic Car Sunday

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