McLaren’s Solus GT takes Goodwood hillclimb victory but Travis Pastrana's Subaru steals the show

McLaren’s Solus GT hypercar set the fastest time up the Goodwood Festival of Speed Hillclimb as part of the traditional fast-car shootout that rounds off the Festival’s weekend.

Well, almost a weekend — this year, for the first time in the Festival’s 30-year history, all of the Saturday events had to be cancelled because of high winds, which threatened the high-rise temporary structures and marquees dotting the paddock, not to mention the priceless Porsches dangling above the front lawn of Goodwood House, suspended from Jerry Judah’s sculpture. 

By Sunday morning, thankfully, all was well again, and the Festival snapped back into gear with McLaren as an obvious favourite to take the hillclimb title for 2023 with the remarkable Solus GT.

Grand Prix car for the road

The Solus is pretty close to being a Grand Prix car you can buy, thanks to a single-seat layout under a canopy roof, and a wailing, naturally-aspirated (i.e. no turbos) 5.2-litre V10 engine designed especially for the car by F1 engine maker Judd. It develops 830bhp and drives the rear wheels only.

Combine that with 1,200kg of claimed downforce, squashing the massive tyres into the track surface, and you have a vehicle virtually designed to go fast at; although not quite as perfect for the job as the remarkable active-downforce, 1,000bhp electric McMurtry Spéirling, which smashed the overall hillclimb record last year. That car was only on display this year, not competing, which left the door open for another car to claim to be the fastest car of 2023.

In the event, the Solus GT — originally designed for the virtual world only in the Sony PlayStation Gran Turismo game — set a time of 45.34sec up the Goodwood hill with German racing driver Marvin Kirchhöfer at the wheel. That’s a full six seconds off the McMurtry’s pace from last year.

Still, 45sec to get up the hill at Goodwood is not to be sniffed at, so the Solus GT is hardly a laggard. Which makes it all the more surprising that in second place, with a time of 46.37sec, was a Subaru estate. 

Family car for the track

Of course, it was no ordinary Subaru estate. This was the Subaru GL Family Huckster, driven by American stunt legend Travis Pastrana.

The once-humble Subaru is powered by a 2.3-litre turbocharged engine producing 862bhp, gets a purpose-built tube-frame chassis and, while the exterior looks like a stock family car, all of the bodywork is made of carbon fibre. It even has active aerodynamics that make every run up the hill a spectacle as the various control surfaces pop up from the body.

In third place was another McLaren, this time a James Hunt-era 1976 McLaren M23 F1 car, powered by the classic Ford-Cosworth DFV V8 engine. Driven by experienced historic racing car driver Michael Lyons, the seventies McLaren finished just half-a-second behind the ballistic Subaru, with a time of 46.89sec.

Fourth was held by Adam Smalley, driving a current Porsche 911 GT3 Cup race car, setting a time of 47.40sec.

In fifth place was British Touring Car Championship racer Jake Hill, driving something of a four-wheeled legend — the Nissan Skyline GTR R32 in the Calsonic racing livery, originally part of a team of Nissan race cars that went undefeated in Japanese racing for four seasons. That set a time of 46.18sec. 

Next up was classic car collector Florent Moulin, driving a 1990s Dodge Viper Le Mans racer, setting a time of 48.29sec.

Seventh was the first of the road cars, the massively powerful Rimac Nevera electric hypercar, driven by Miro Zrncevic, chief test driver for both Rimac and Bugatti. That set a time of 49.32sec, making it the fastest electric production car to have ever taken on the famous Goodwood Festival of Speed hillclimb.

The Rimac was even faster than a current rally car — French rally specialist Adrien Fourmaux set a time of 49.47sec in the current Ford Puma Hybrid WRC car. He was just ahead of Aridan Morrow in a Ferrari 488 Challenge racer, on 49.88sec, while the top-ten was rounded out by the impressively-moustachioed Olaf Manthey, the great German racing driver and team owner, at the wheel of a Porsche 911 GT2 RS Clubsport 25, setting a time of 51.44sec.

Although the McLaren Solus GT recorded the fastest time at the 2023 event, it wasn’t fast enough to break into the all-time top five for the venue.

Related articles

• After reading about the McLaren Solus GT at Goodwood, check out our exclusive Q&A with the Duke of Richmond ahead of this year’s event
• Also take a look at our guide to the 2023 Goodwood Festival of Speed
• And here are the top 5 fastest ever Goodwood Festival of Speed hillclimb cars