MOSS TRIBUTE AT THE HEART OF SPEEDWEEK
SIR STIRLING MOSS WAS A HERO TO EVERYBODY WHO SAW HIM RACE IN HIS POMP AS THE ultimate professional, or in his dotage. He was King of Goodwood where, at just 19, he won his first race in a Cooper 500 on opening day in September 1948, and competed into his eighties at Revival Meetings and Festivals of Speed. ‘Mr Motor Racing’ passed away in April, aged 90, and it was inconceivable that there could be no send-off at the place where his peerless record was topped by four successive Royal Automobile Club Tourist Trophy victories, in Aston Martin DBR1s and Ferrari 250 GT Berlinettas.
In this strange year in which the COVID-19 pandemic continues to wreak havoc globally, claiming lives, threatening livelihoods and wiping out businesses, the Duke of Richmond and Gordon’s empire was in trouble. Forced to cancel 2020’s Members’ Meeting, Festival of Speed and Revival – its lifeblood alongside horse racing – his grace and the GRRC team pinned their hopes on SpeedWeek, one special microcosm event to keep the flame burning, without spectators but live-streamed to the world. At its masked, socially distanced epicentre, Saturday’s Stirling Moss Memorial Trophy for pre-1963 GT cars delivered a fitting tribute.
As if the grid forming, from Dire Straits’ album , rang out. A lump-in-throat moment for all as they thought of Stirling, and Lady Susie.
