Britain’s annual Goodwood Festival of Speed is an iconic hill climb held in West Sussex. The climb pits some of the world’s most exclusive bespoke vehicles against one another on a gruelling 1.86km, nine-turn route.
The climb record remains Nick Heidfeld’s 1999 time of 41.6 seconds, achieved in a McLaren MP4/13 Formula One racer—though any time of under a minute is considered exceptional.
The 2015 Festival has unearthed an unusual victor—the Rolls-Royce Wraith coupe. Under the command of Joerg Weidinger, the two-door version of the Rolls-Royce Ghost completed the climb in just 57.21 seconds.
The Wraith tips the scales at nearly two-and-a-half tonnes. It finds its motivation from a 6.6-litre twin-turbocharged V12, making 465kW of power and 800Nm of torque—nothing to sneeze at.
The 57-second time was good enough to beat the time of a number of more obvious quick coupes: the Maserati GranTurismo MC Stradale (00:59:00), Bentley Continental GT (01:00:56), Maserati GranCabrio MC (01:00:66), and the Porsche 918 Spyder hypercar (01:01:37) found themselves subjugated to the big Roller, which finished the course at a remarkable 170km/h.
