Ford proved to be the fastest up Goodwood this year with a 1,400-horsepower electric SuperVan that the company, for some reason, refuses to sell to the public. It ran the 1.17-mile hill climb in 43.98 seconds, which proved to be the fastest time of the day, even if it didn’t face much serious competition this year. The heavily modified Ford E-Transit was driven by Romain Dumas who, in 2019, broke the previous record that Nikki Heidfeld set in 1998. The SuperVan didn’t prove to be quite as quick as the Volkswagen ID R that Dumas drove five years ago, but hey, a win is still a win.
While Dumas set a new record behind the wheel of the ID R with a time of 39.9 seconds, he’s not actually the current record holder. Instead, that honor belongs to the McMurtry Spéirling, a tiny, largely unknown track car that costs a couple million dollars, makes about 1,000 hp and uses a fan for downforce just like the Chaparral 2J. It’s also a numbers monster, capable of hitting 60 mph in just 1.4 seconds and running the quarter mile in less than eight seconds.
Ford’s biggest competition at the hill climb this year proved to be Subaru’s Project Midnight, a heavily modified WRX that makes 670 hp. Despite the horsepower disadvantage, Scott Speed kept the Subaru competitive in qualifying, nearly matching the Ford SuperVan’s pace in qualifying. On Sunday, though, Dumas managed to find a couple extra seconds, while Speed lost a step.
This also isn’t the first time that Ford has shown its electric SuperVan to be an absolute track monster. Earlier this year, it set a new record at Bathurst, breaking the record previously set by Christopher Mies in an Audi R8 LMS. It also previously ran Pikes Peak.