Phil and I were at the Goodwood Revival Meeting at the weekend
and a splendid time was had by all.
Here's a sweet little sequence of pictures, featuring the gravel-trap mayhem above.
Being at the right place at the right time is essential if you want to see boffo slidey action.
We like to hang around the fast double-apex Lavant corner
as that's where even the finest racing drivers tend to get it wrong.
You can tell when a driver hits the first apex on opposite lock that something is not going right.
This beautiful car came out of the first part of the corner with the back end sliding left
in an attempt to overtake the front end.
The driver is steering hard left to try to counteract it but …
… there's only so much tarmac and suddenly he's going sideways across the grass.
Very fast.
Ka-pow!
Actually, more of a loud crunching sound as the car hits the gravel trap.
For once I got my pan and zoom technique just right. Yay!
A good racing driver doesn't stall when he hits the gravel trap;
he puts pedal to the metal and strives to keep the car going until it reaches the grass run-off area.
Hence all the smoke.
Hoorah!
Back on track and racing off down the Lavant Straight as if nothing had happened.
More motoring mayhem to follow.
And maybe some girls, too …
Enjoy!
8 comments:
More Goodwood photos!
The shot with the gravel is amazing. And on the nerdy end of things, have you ever really looked at the phrase "pedal to the metal" and noticed how the two key words are spelled differently but pronounced the same? Just caught me as odd.
Ah, those words only sound the same in Ohio, Robyn. Hee hee.
The gravel shot was a total fluke. I just happened to be panning across to try to get a good shot of the car and noticed the driver sawing away at the steering wheel and the car drifting seriously off-line, so I kept on panning and zooming and clicking away and hoped for the best … which is probably how professional photographers do it as well.
Well, this reminds me of how much I miss standing in Turn 1 at Indy to take pictures, but w/o gravel pits. Watching an Indy car race this weekend on TV, though, made me realize how having that camera to pan the action acted as a buffer to the anxiety I felt over cars wheel-to-wheel at well over 200-mph. Makes me admire even more the reflexes, determination, and intellect of the drivers, with their squishy bodies inside carbon carapaces.
In the steam-driven world, we had motor drives. I'd watch the cars and follow the action through my lens as I held down the shutter. I can't afford the digital equivalent or I'd still be taking pictures.
Oh, and Robyn, if it was "Petal to the metal" the driver wouldn't be going very fast, he'd be just another "balloon foot" amid the "lead feet" creating a dreaded "moving chicane."
Carbon carapaces … You have as fine a way with words as you do with images, Speedway.
I dare not use the motor drive on my 60D. I already take many hundreds more photographs than I need; with the motor drive I'd be getting through 16Gb memory cards like I used to get through 36 exposure film canisters.
You so need to steal a good camera and get back to the race track.
Balloon-foot is another great phrase; you're full of them today.
Excellent series of photos! Great action shots and narrative. Yay for motor mayhem!
Pedal to the medal might be a mean kick in the chest.
Thank you, Ms.M and yay indeedy.
Ouch, Petrea! Check out the next post for real pedal to the metal action.
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