Aston on top in first Goodwood 9 Hours – 65 years ago!

And today’s is no exception. Sixty-five years ago, on August 16^th 1952, the circuit hosted its first international sportscar race, the BARC News of the World International 9 Hours.  

And, unsurprisingly, it attracted an entry comprising the very best endurance-racing manufacturers, all out to make the most of that all-important adage ‘win at the weekend, sell in the week’.

Allard, Aston Martin, Ferrari, Frazer Nash, Jaguar and Talbot fielded cars, each with two drivers set to share 680 miles of high-speed jousting around the 2.4-mile circuit. 

Jaguar’s formidable works line-up – a trio of C-types for Stirling Moss/Peter Walker, Duncan Hamilton/Tony Rolt and Ian Stewart/Peter Whitehead – was favourite to set the pace, and that was compounded by the cars’ top-three qualifying rout, Moss securing pole in the #1 machine.

At exactly 3pm the 30 starting drivers ran across a damp track to their waiting cars in Le Mans-style to begin an enduro that wouldn’t finish until midnight.

Rolt made the early running, ahead of Moss, although Aston Martin’s gorgeous factory-run trio of straight-six DB3s, shared by Reg Parnell/Eric Thompson, George Abecassis/Dennis Poore and Peter Collins/Pat Griffith were soon a threat to their bigger-engined British rivals despite only qualifying 11^th, 12^th and 13th. 

Grand Prix hero Parnell worked his 3-litre, short-tail DB3 up to the front but a pit fire just before one-third distance put paid to his hopes of glory.

It would be one of the 2.5-litre Astons, the #17 car of Collins/Griffith, that took advantage of Parnell’s retirement and two of the Jaguars stopping through early accident damage and a three-quarter-distance half-shaft failure. 

Under cover of darkness, Aston Martin went on to secure a famous victory, with Collins, a future Grand Prix star, and Griffith finishing two laps ahead of the 2.7-litre V12 Ferrari 225 S of Tom Cole and Graham Whitehead. The sister car, pedalled by Bobbie Baird and Roy Salvadori, a man who’d become a serial winner at Goodwood, finished third, albeit a further three laps in arrears.

If you’re coming to the 20^th Revival Meeting in a few weeks’ time, look out for the 1952 9 Hours-winning DB3 – it’ll be a front-runner in the Freddie March Memorial Trophy in the hands of owner Martin Melling and ace racer/preparer Rob Hall, yet again adding immeasurable patina to the annual Motor Circuit retrospective.

Photography courtesy of LAT Images