The Pikes Peak Quattro: Walter Rohrl will drive it at Goodwood
Audi celebrates centenary at Goodwood
It’s been a while since I last went to the Goodwood Festival – a celebration of motorsport at Goodwood, in Sussex.
But it’s a fabulous event. I liked going on the Friday – fewer crowds, more proximity to the cars, and you could still watch the cars practising up the hill. I often went with a friend of mine who had a passion for old Mercedes…and a Morris Minor.
This year – over July 3-5 – there is the chance to witness former world rally champion Walter Rohrl and Le Mans legend Jacky Ickx. Both are coming to help celebrate Audi’s 100 years.
Walter Rohrl will be driving an original flame-belching 1986 Audi Sport Quattro S1 Pikes Peak rally car.
Pikes Peak is an awesome (to use American phraseology) 12.5-mile, 156-corner hill climb in Colorado. It features sheer drops off the narrow, winding and rocky track to the 14,000 feet summit.
Until Audiarrived in 1985, the hill had been the preserve of special machines built for the Pikes Peak climb. But that was until Michele Mouton arrived with the four-wheel drive Quattro. Not only did she win the event, she did it in a four-wheel drive car…and…and…she was female to rub salt into the old boys’ wounds!
The following year, American auto racing legend Bobby Unser Sr stepped into the Quattro and duly won. But the one climb that really stood out was in 1987, when Walter Rohrl, on his last ascent, was the first driver to dip under the 11m bracket with a stunning 10:47.85.
The sound of the 600bhp 2.1-litre five-cylinder turbo Audi Sport Quattro S1 as it blasts up the Goodwood hill will no doubt be quite incredible.
So too will the 1936 Auto Union C-Type Grand Prix single-seater that Jacky Ickx will drive.
Ickx will best be remembered as the man who won the Le Mans 24 Hour race six times – the first man ever to do so. I was fortunate to be there as a cub reporter for Autosport at the time he won his sixth victory in 1982. Co-driving with Derek Bell, the pair led a Rothmans Porsche 956 1-2-3.
I also saw Ickx drive when he was an aspiring and quite brilliant single-seater driver. My old man used to take me to Crystal Palace race circuit when I was a boy. I was intoxicated by the smell, noise and atmosphere of the place.
Ickx won the 1967 London Trophy in a Matra. One day I’ll get my dad to look out all his fabulous photos – I have asked! – so you can see what it was like then to have the F1 aces mixing it with the young turks on the way up. Until then I’ll have to point you to www.jacky-icky-fan.net.
Anyway, Ickx will be at the wheel of one of the fearsome rear-engined pre-war Auto Unions. The V16-engined ‘Silver Arrow’ was capable of reaching speeds in excess of 220mph during its heyday. Like the Quattro, the sound the Auto Union will be…well, awesome!
