The first motor race at Goodwood was on 18th September, 1948, after fighter pilot Tony Gaze suggested to the then-Duke of Richmond, Freddie March, that the perimeter road of RAF Westhampnett would make a challenging circuit. After 15,000 people turned up to that meeting, three more events were planned for 1949.

The Junior Car Club had absorbed the Brooklands Automobile Racing Club and became the British Automobile Racing Club (BARC), which still organises the meetings at Goodwood to this day. However, neither the BARC nor the Duke were very happy with the behaviour of the public in 1948…

The lack of grandstands meant that the crowds couldn’t see the track, so migrated to the less-than-stable roofs of the wartime aerodrome buildings. Sure enough, some collapsed, and racing was suspended until larger spectator enclosures could be built. Instead of the Whitsun meeting, the second meeting of 1949 became the first BARC Members’ Meeting, on August 13, 1949. Things went smoother, and it even prompted Motor Sport to label it as “most enjoyable,” partly thanks to “only one accident”.

The Members’ Meetings were an equivalent of America’s ‘run what ya brung’ racing scene, but many big names emerged. Mike Hawthorn was the Motor Sport Brooklands Memorial Trophy winner in 1951, while Stirling Moss starred alongside his future team-mate Tony Brooks. There was also the likes of Chris Bristow, Innes Ireland, Jim Clark, John Surtees, Peter Arundell, Richard Attwood, Piers Courage, Peter Gethin, Derek Bell and Brian Redman, who all went on to compete in Formula 1.

The well-worn ‘the right crowd and no crowding’ slogan of Brooklands was carried on to the Goodwood Members’ Meetings but, far from being as snobbish as it sounds, it was a case of these meetings operating with their own communities. If you had something to race, bring it along and you were welcomed.

When the circuit closed for racing in 1966, the Members’ Meetings (all 71 of them) came to a halt as well. In 2014, the idea was revived: “I still remember,” said Lord March at the time, “attending the 71st Members’ Meeting as a boy with my grandfather, Freddie March, just before he closed the circuit.

“Now, after a gap of 48 years, the Goodwood Members’ Meeting is back. The event has been brought very much into the modern era and the Gerry Marshal Trophy for Group 1 saloons will be the first time that cars produced after 1966 have ever raced on the circuit, while the Group B rally sprint, Le Mans low-drag prototypes and turbocharged Formula 1 cars will add an additional layer of excitement.”

One of the great ideas for the new Members’ Meetings – alongside all the games such as ferret racing, rugby, cricket and tug-o-war, of course – were the high-speed demonstrations. Le Mans cars at dusk, DFV Formula 1 cars and then Anthony Davidson in a 2013 Mercedes F1 machine.

“When you’re told you’ve got to do it, you’ve got to do it,” Davidson said after driving the V8 car. “It was my first ever experience of the Goodwood Circuit, so it was a bit of a baptism of fire [I know how you feel Ant]. It was a real privilege to drive a Formula 1 car here, though, as it hasn’t been done for more than 20 years.”