All six Shelby Cobra Daytona coupes, the groundbreaking aerodynamic race cars designed by Peter Brock for high top speeds at Le Mans, will be brought together, apparently for the first time, during the Goodwood Revival in September.
The British classic car lovefest will mark the anniversary of the Ford V8-powered racers debut at Daytona on their way to a GT III Class win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans that beat arch-rival Ferrari and its fiery 250 GTOs.
The Daytona coupes will be part of a special demonstration run each day at Goodwood, along with other significant Shelby Cobras. At least two of the Daytonas will run in the Revival’s main race, the RAC Tourist Trophy Celebration, where they will again face the likes of Ferrari GTOs and Jaguar D-Types.
The Shelby Daytonas and Cobras will be shown at Goodwood within the main paddock in an area designed to resemble the pit lane of the 1965 Sebring 12 Hours.
The Cobra Daytona was designed by a young Brock for the race team of Carroll Shelby, who wanted to increase the speeds of his Cobra roadsters on Le Man’s Mulsanne Straight. The controversial aerodynamic solution created by Brock succeeded not only in beating the reigning GTOs at the 1964 Le Mans marathon but helped the Shelby American team take the World Manufacturers Championship away from Ferrari in 1965.
Last year, the original Cobra Daytona became the first automobile accepted to the National Historic Vehicle Register, a program by the Historic Vehicle Association and the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Library of Congress.
The gathering of Shelby Cobra Daytonas will be a special highlight of the Goodwood Revival, held September 13-15 at the historic Goodwood Circuit in Chichester, West Sussex. More than 150,000 people are expected to attend the annual motorsports spectacular.
