Goodwood might be the most unhinged thing to involve racing cars in England since the British Touring Car days of the 1990s. Whether you are at the race track watching the historical races filled with priceless machinery that is running like you’ve traveled back in time to the good old days, or if you’re watching the bonzai blasts up the drive to see who is going to do more than make a quiet pass, Goodwood is the a bucket-list event that needs to be checked off before you check out. Where else will you see a Ford GT40 driven at full chat anymore? Where else will you see Jaguars and Stingrays battle it out?

As always with automotive pursuits, there is that element of danger, the risky part that every driver knows exists. That’s the moment where things go wrong. Things happen at Goodwood. It’s not everyday that someone jumps a sports-utility across the grass, is there?

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By the hair that sat on the front spoiler of his Pontiac, did Ricky Craven win the 2003 Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 race. One of the two closest NASCAR finishes ever (Clint Bowyer and Jimmie Johnson, in a four-car-wide photo finish in 2011, tied the margin of victory), the last lap battle between Craven and Busch brought back images of door-slamming, sideways NASCAR racing that many fans had considered a lost part of the sport. The cars were silhouettes racers, long past the days of actual “stock”cars, and many of the old-school drivers were out of the sport. But then there came the final battle, the one that would stand the entire crowd on their feet, and would cause commentator and former racer Darrell Waltrip to go into racer mode…listen to him on the white flag lap and you can almost see him watching the cars while picking out the right racing lines with his hands. Neither Craven’s Pontiac nor Busch’s Taurus were doing well, with Busch fighting a failing power steering pump and both cars getting loose. On the second-to-last lap, Craven tried to pass in Turn One and things didn’t go well for either driver, with Busch slapping the wall and Craven getting loose enough for Busch to recover and walk away. The last lap has since become NASCAR legend, with Craven trying for a move in Turn 3 and the last run turning into a side-by-side run with both cars rubbing through the finish line. The margin of victory was .002 seconds, the closest recorded margin of victory recorded since NASCAR switched to electronic timing in 1993.

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The Acura NSX is the most non-Honda product the company ever made. Basically, Honda showed Ferrari how to build a sports car that wasn’t a tempermental little bitch to deal with on a daily basis. They had Aryton Senna involved with the development program and he didn’t spare the rod when creating this baby. The end result was the first all-aluminum body car that was packing a 3.0L V6 with VTEC. That’s it. Okay, in 1997 the engine got a bump to 3.2L in size, but that’s it. And there’s nothing wrong with that! An NSX is a great car. Gordon Murray, the man who was responsible for the McLaren F1, owned and cherished his, claiming it as the greatest thing since sliced bread.

This NSX looks like the car you win in a race in a video game. The huge wing, the front splitter situation, those wheels and the livery…it’s legit. This machine is a time attack car. Dog box transmission, a 9,000 RPM redline, and a Honda K-series four-cylinder providing the grunt. Think about how many wicked four-banger Hondas there are out there. Now think about how many built Honda V6s you can name off that aren’t stuffed into an F1 car. See the reasoning yet? If not, wait until you hear this machine in action. You’ll get it then.

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