MAY 2019 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 87deep into three figures down the pit straight at the circuit. You can’t do that
at the NEC.
The experiences it can provide mean Goodwood’s revenues grow every
year despite visitor numbers being capped. For a man entitled to wear a
coronet, the Duke is remarkable modest about the scale and significance
of what he has built. ‘I don’t do a bloody thing,’ he says. ‘I just sit here and
drink lots of cups of tea.’ This is untrue. I once sat a row in front of him
and his staff on an Easyjet bound for the Geneva show, and overheard them
planning their military assault on the decision makers of the big car manu-
facturers. He is intimately involved in every aspect of these events. He once
told me how many lightbulbs illuminate the row of street-food stalls in the
hangar at the Members’ Meeting.
I wonder if his title impresses CEOs and billionaire collectors, and opens
doors which might otherwise stay shut. ‘I think, on the whole, it might
mean they think twice about not replying. So in that sense it might help a
bit. But I still get plenty of people who never bloody write back.’
With his good looks, subtle but immensely stylish tailoring, statement
specs and VPH (Very Posh Hair) he makes the perfect front man for what
he has created. He’s not media-shy: you’ll have read interviews with him
before. But they often focus on the events. I wanted to ask about him:
where his love of cars comes from, how deep it runs.
‘If you really want to know where all this began, it was with this,’ he says,
reaching to the shelves crammed with motoring books. This one is kept in
easy reach: The Automobile Book from 1962, by Ralph Stein. ‘My grand-
mother was very good at fostering my relationship with my grandfather [a
racer and aviator who brought both to Goodwood] so I’m sure she bought
this book, but she said it came from him. Here’s my name: CH Settrington,
as I was at the time. I fell in love with these pictures. This book played a big
part in all this. I remember at school, aged about 13, desperately trying to go
to sleep and thinking about these cars. I’m a firm believer that if you want
something enough you can get it. And they’ve all been here, these cars:
every single bloody one, really. And a hell of a lot of them I’ve driven.
‘I first drove just down there,’ he says, motioning from the office window
to the drive below. ‘I spent hours terrorising everyone. I’d set off from the
stableyard and go up the hill to my grandfather’s house. I’d fly off all the
time. The kart used to blow up constantly and I’d have to go to West Ham
to get piston rings for it. They were so fragile. They’d break again and I’d go
back up to West Ham to get some more. It took all day.’
‘When I was 16 I bought a Morgan 3-Wheeler for 200 quid, from Little-
hampton. It was a complete pile of junk, but I was mobile. I had my hat and
my goggles. It was cool, until the back wheel fell off.
‘Then I had the gorgeous Datsun Cherry 100A. My father was a great
modernist so he thought a Japanese car had to be the thing. I put Cosmic
wheels on it and painted all the wheel centres blue. I had the Datsun when
I was working with Stanley Kubrick as a photographer, so I was roaring
around the country in it.
‘After that I went to Africa for a year and when I came back, rather to my
horror my father had given the car to the cook. I felt a little bit hard done
by. He didn’t really believe in possessions. It didn’t occur to him that it was
important to me. Having a car has always been important to me. She’d used
it to pick up milk from the farm and spilled a churn of it in the back. The ⊲‘I went to Africa for a yearand when I came back, to myhorror my father had giventhe car to the cook’SENSING AN
OPPORTUNITY
‘Maybe the best thing that
could have happened was
that my grandfather shut
the circuit in ’66. I was
very upset about that as a
small boy. But if he hadn’t,
maybe it would now just
be another circuit. The
Festival of Speed isn’t at
the circuit, I know. But it
still carries that Good-
wood spirit, which we felt
was kind of in the air. At
the outset I wondered
if Goodwood still meant
anything to anybody. All
I’ve done is put it back
together, in a way.’SEEING THE VALUE
OF NOSTALGIA
‘When we started off,
you went round all these
massive companies and
their old car collections
were shot to pieces. They
weren’t as interested in
heritage. I’m just sorry we
didn’t buy all the right cars
at the right time. I mean,
we created a race for
GT40s, and we didn’t buy
GT40s...’
BEING PICK Y
‘The whole point of the
Festival is that it draws
the best cars in the world.
Unless it’s the best exam-
ple of its type, we don’t
want it particularly, so we
can be very snooty about
that. You’ve got to be rich
to own some of the cars,
but it’s the enthusiasm, the
shared experience that’s
important in motoring,
whether you’ve got a GTO
or a crappy old Mini.’THE DUKE
HOW I GOT HERE
Cof fee with CAR