Goodwood Revival to celebrate Jim Clark in 2025

Born in the small Scottish village of Kilmany in 1936, Jim Clark grew up on a farm, and began his life in motorsport racing his own Sunbeam Talbot in local rally and hillclimb events. His first competitive race meeting took place at Crimond, but he was entered unknowingly by his close friend Ian Scott-Watson. At the wheel of a woefully slow DKW Sonderklasse in a field that also included a pair of Lotus 11s, Clark’s performance was still of a calibre that confirmed his talent.

Scott-Watson went on to manage and mentor Clark, and the following two years saw him compete regularly and successfully in a Lotus Elite. His performances were difficult to ignore, and Scott-Watson eventually decided to revive the Border Reivers team, which had gone bust two years before, around Clark with the purchase of a new Jaguar D-Type.

At the wheel of the D-Type, Clark was immediately successful. He won several sportscar races in 1958, but that year was perhaps more significant for him as the beginning of what would become a lifelong connection with Lotus.

Border Reivers bought a Lotus Elite, in which Clark was again instantly competitive, and with it he made his first appearance at the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1959 alongside a young John Whitmore. In the GT 1.5 class the pair achieved a second-place finish, tenth overall. It was a performance that would eventually convince Colin Chapman to give Clark, still a relative new boy on the motorsport scene, a chance in his Formula Junior programme.

Jim Clark became a Team Lotus driver in 1960, and won his first race for the team at Goodwood ahead of John Surtees and Trevor Taylor. But his meteoric rise continued, and he made his Formula 1 debut weeks later, driving a Lotus 18 at the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort.

Although he retired from his debut outing with a mechanical failure, he scored points at his next races at Spa-Francorchamps and Reims, and stood on the podium for the first time in Portugal at just his fifth Grand Prix. Alongside his exploits in F1, Clark won his first single-seater title that year as he claimed the Formula Junior Championship. He also achieved his best finish at Le Mans, third place overall alongside Roy Salvadori in an Aston Martin DBR1.

More podiums followed in 1961 as Clark completed his first full season in F1, but the arrival of the Lotus 25 in 1962 finally provided him with a car capable of matching his considerable skill. He won three races that year, but poor reliability saw him fall short of the title.

He put that right a year later, winning seven races on his way to one of the most dominant championship victories of that era. In all he completed three Grand Slams, and scored more than double the number of points of his nearest challenger, more than he needed to, because only the best six scores counted.

Poor reliability struck again in ’64, and although Clark won the most races that season, he lost out to John Surtees in the Championship. The 1965 season, however, was another masterclass from the Scotsman, once again scoring maximum points with six Grand Prix wins to claim his second title and confirm his status as one of the all-time greats. That year also saw Clark take victory in the Indianapolis 500, the first for a rear-engined car and the only for Team Lotus. He also won Championships in the Tasman Series and British Formula 2 to complete the most successful year of his career.

It would however be the last time Jim Clark held the World Championship trophy aloft, as poor reliability reared its head once again to limit him to just a single victory in 1966. The Lotus 49 promised a return to form in 1968, but he was sadly never able to deliver on that promise.

Clark won the opening race of the ’68 season, but then travelled to Hockenheim for a Formula 2 race on 7^th April 1968. Ford had requested he race its new GT40 at Brands Hatch on that weekend, but contractual requirements saw him line up on the grid in Germany alongside the likes of Graham Hill, Piers Courage and John Surtees.

The weather was dire, with extremely poor visibility on the high-speed circuit, but Jim Clark’s fatal accident on lap five cast an even deeper shadow over the entirety of world motorsport. The cause was never discovered, but his contemporaries refused to believe a man of his talent could have made an error like that.

Few drivers have come close to the esteem with which Jim Clark is held. Many of the sport’s greatest names, the likes of Juan Manuel Fangio and Jackie Stewart, have proclaimed the sheep farmer from Kilmany to be the most talented driver in history. At the time of his death, he held records in F1 for the most victories, the most pole positions, and would more than likely have claimed many more Championships were it not for the fragility of his Lotus cars.

But his exploits in F1 are just part of the incredible story of Jim Clark. He was equally famous for his versatility, winning races in numerous categories all over the world. He won the 1964 British Saloon Car Championship driving a Lotus Cortina, a car he also took to the RAC Rally of Great Britain in 1966. He also raced in Champ Car and NASCAR over in the US, regularly competing at the front, and always extracting the most from whatever car he climbed into.

There’s no doubt Jim Clark was one of the best racing drivers in history. Few have come close to achieving what he did, at a time when the difference between success and failure so often correlated with life and death. No other drivers have been idolised by their contemporaries quite like Clark. Some of the best to ever race would name him as their hero, the man they all looked up to, and Goodwood will celebrate his legacy in the biggest possible way at the 2025 Revival.

Tickets for the Goodwood Revival are now available! Saturday tickets are selling fast, so secure yours now to avoid missing out, and don’t forget to take advantage of early bird pricing to save up to 10 per cent when you book before 1^st May 2025.

Images courtesy of Getty Images.