Last weekend, the Goodwood Festival of Speed celebrated its 25th anniversary in great style. For the Silver Jubilee, the Duke of Richmond invited some of the many great cars that had starred at the event in the past. They were joined by a whole host of other interesting machinery, headlined by the mighty Volkswagen I.D. R that had just shattered the record on the Pikes Peak Hill Climb. Taking centre stage at the Festival of Speed this year was Porsche's 70th anniversary, celebrated with the central feature display and five dedicated classes. Among the other anniversaries marked during the event were the Jaguar XK's 70th and Lola's 60th both with special classes. As always, there was much activity around the event which included the Cartier Style et Luxe Concours d'Elegance with cars that ranged from a McLaren F1 to a Citroen 2CV. Bonhams delivered their 50th Goodwood sale in great style with a sale total of GBP 32 million.
Our photographers were on hand throughout the weekend and have returned with an action packed 320-shot gallery that serves to illustrate our detailed report.

Every two years, the rich and ever expanding history of the 24 Hours of Le Mans is celebrated during the Le Mans Classic. Held for the ninth time last week, the event is run on the full, 13.6km Circuit de la Sarthe. The main event features six grids each of which has three races during a 24-hour period between 4pm on Saturday and 4pm on Sunday. That means that not only does the event boast the full circuit with its legendary straights, it also features a night race for each grid. While the main event covers cars from 1923 through to 1981, thanks to support races for Group C cars and the new-for-this-year Global Endurance Legends the full history of the world's most famous endurance race is covered. In addition to the action on the track, the Le Mans Classic also boasts more than a weekend's worth of infield attractions.
This year's Le Mans Classic was bigger in every respect and also attracted a record crowd of 135,000 spectators despite scorching conditions. Our photographers skipped a night's sleep to bring you an action packed 290-shot gallery, which serves to illustrate this concise report.

While we are still hard at work to process all the material we gathered at this weekend's Le Mans Classic, we also already have to look ahead to this weekend's Goodwood Festival of Speed. Celebrating its 25th anniversary by bringing back some of the many great cars that starred at the event's previous editions, it promises to be a true classic. We will of course be there and report on it next week.
Before we do that, we have highlighted four single seater races that starred at last year's edition. The most recent of the quartet is the first Penske PC22 Chevrolet of eight examples built for the 1993 season. After a difficult 1992 season, the Nigel Bennett designed PC22 returned Team Penske to the sharp end of the field. The Ilmor/Chevrolet engined cars won eight of the 16 races, including the Indy 500 with Emerson Fittipaldi at the wheel. The featured example was the test and development car and could well have been the PC22 tested by none other than Ayrton Senna early in 1993. Last year, it was the second fastest car up the hill climb. Another great Indy car that is a regular at the Festival of Speed is this turbine-engined Lotus 56. As can be seen in our extensive gallery, it has been driven by likes of Dario Franchitti and Emanuele Pirro and also event organiser Charles March.
Formula 1 cars are also always strongly represented at Goodwood and at the previous edition we were treated to a couple of runs of the Sir Jackie Stewart's 1971 World Championship winning Tyrrell 003 Cosworth. Owned by the Stewart family for many years, the single most successful Tyrrell made a rare appearance in the hands of Paul Stewart and Damon Hill.
Another Grand Prix car that starred in 2017 was this Ferrari 312 B3/74. Raced by Niki Lauda to two wins in 1974, this car represented a turning point in Ferrari's fortunes that would ultimately lead to three World Championships between 1975 and 1979.
You can also still attend the event yourself as limited tickets are still available on the Goodwood website.

This weekend, we will be at the Le Mans Classic, which promises to be one of the absolute highlights of the year. Part of the very busy events is a Artcurial Motorcars auction. Fittingly, the sale is headlined by a trio of GT racers. The earliest and most valuable is this Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona Group 4. Sold new to Luigi Chinetti, this was one of the prototypes for the Competizione Daytonas that were built between 1971 and 1973. Chassis 12467 was raced to fifth overall at Le Mans in 1971 and is now estimated to find a new owner on Saturday for well over Euro 6 million.
Built at the end of the same decade is this Ford Zakspeed Capri. Built to the Group 5 'silhouette' regulations this blisteringly quick Capri was successful in the DRM and was also driven to the European Hill Climb Championship in 1982. Available for sale for the first time in three decades, the very rare Zakspeed Capri is estimated to sell for Euro 550,000 - 750,000.
GT racing has been Porsche's bread and butter for many years and the successful run of the last two decades was kick started by the 911 Carrera RSR 3.8 of 1993. The example consigned to the Le Mans Classic sale was built to full racing specifications but ultimately was never raced in period. Instead it was cherished by its owners and rarely used. As a result this RSR 3.8 has barely 4,000km on the odometer. It can be yours for around Euro 800,000.

Using the universally acclaimed 570S as the base, McLaren have developed the 600LT. As the name suggests, it is a 600hp, Long Tail version of McLaren's compact sports car. A lot of work went into creating the car, which is 96kg lighter than the 540S despite being 74mm longer. In fact 23% of the parts are different. The twin turbo V8 breaths even better thanks to top mounted exhausts, which are part of the shortest exhaust system ever fitted on a McLaren. Production of the 600LT will be limited to a run of around one year and prices start at GBP 185,000.
This morning, Nissan and Italdesign surprised us with the release of the first details of the Nissan GT-R50 by Italdesign. As the name suggests, the car is Italdesign's take on the latest generation GT-R. Accordingly, it features many unique design cues but it still instantly recognisable as a GT-R. Built to celebrate both Italdesign's and the GT-R's 50th anniversaries, there are currently no plans to put the GT-R50 in production. It may, however, inspire the designer of the all-new GT-R that should arrive in the next couple of years.

Following a teaser a few weeks ago, Aston Martin have revealed the full details of the new DBS Superleggera. The range-topping model is powered by a 715 bhp version of the twin-turbo V12 engine and features a very aggressive exterior styling dominated by a large air-intake. Available later this year from GBP 225,000, the DBS Superleggera has a top speed of 342 km/h.
Next week, we will be at Le Mans for the biennial Le Mans Classic. Among the cars due to star in the Global Endurance Legends support event is this Bentley Speed 8. One of five cars built for the 2003 season, it was used at Sebring and during the Le Mans test. Earlier this year, chassis 004/1 was acquired by the current custodian and he already campaigned the car at the Spa Classic.
One of the cars the Bentley will line up alongside is this fabulous Ferrari 333 SP. Arguably the best sounding racing car of all time, the 333 SP was very successful during throughout the 1990s even though it was never raced by the factory. The example featured today has no period racing history but was raced last weekend at a superb event of the French Grand Prix. We captured it earlier this month at the Grand Prix de l'Age d'Or.