- More than 25 legendary and iconic vehicle brands lined up for Classic Car Friday, entries ranging from 1912 to early 1990s
- King of the Hill features over 20 manufacturers in categories for Road-going saloon cars and Supercars, as well as the race-derived Modified Saloon Cars
- Single-seater and Sports Prototypes category for King of the Hill includes 10 specialist race car manufacturers
- Reigning champions Andre Bezuidenhout, Franco Scribante and Regard Roets will be back in action at the 11th edition of the Simola Hillclimb, which takes place from 7 to 10 May 2020
KNYSNA, South Africa, 26 February 2020 – The remarkable success of the annual Simola Hillclimb over the past 10 editions has been built on the amazing array of cars and drivers that compete in this exceptional event. It has established a peerless reputation for attracting the biggest names in local motorsport, along with a growing contingent of international drivers from around the world.
Each year, the challenging 1.9 km Hillclimb course – which snakes its way up from Knysna to the Simola Hotel, Country Club and Spa – is transformed into a playground for the country’s fastest, wildest and most extreme cars, and it will be no different this year for the 11th Simola Hillclimb which takes place from 7 to 10 May 2020.
“We received almost 200 entry applications this year and were oversubscribed more than a month before submissions closed at the end of January,” says Geoff Goddard, Simola Hillclimb’s sporting director. “Our careful selection and approval process aims to deliver an exciting spectacle that showcases a diverse range of cars and drivers, and the 2020 Simola Hillclimb is sure to surprise and delight the thousands of spectators and hundreds of thousands live-stream viewers around the world.”
Classic Car Friday, taking place on 8 May, is limited to 65 entries, with the line-up featuring more than 25 brands, and spanning nearly eight decades. The oldest car in the field is a 1912 Ford Model T Speedster which will compete against a bevy of vintage entries from Austin, MG and Riley from the 1920s and 1930s in the class for pre-war cars.
Add in a dazzling array of entries from the 1950s all the way to the early 1990s, and there truly is something for everyone – from elegantly styled road cars to thundering tin-tops, thoroughbred sports racers to agile single-seaters.
As the reigning five-time Classic Car Friday winner, Franco Scribante will once again be the man to beat for the overall title and the class victory for pre-1990 single-seaters, sports cars and GTs. His immaculately prepared Chevron B19 will be up against several other specialised race cars from the Seventies and Eighties.
For King of the Hill, which takes place over two days on 9 and 10 May, the line-up is simply breathtaking and, with the two winners gaining entry to the FIA Masters Hillclimb event in Portugal in October, the stakes are higher than ever. From showroom-specification hot hatches to illustrious supercars, championship-winning saloon cars through to some completely wild machines purpose-built for the Simola Hillclimb, motoring enthusiasts are guaranteed to be enthralled by the variety and performance of the machinery blasting off from what is arguably the most scenic and spectacular start line in the country.
More than 30 vehicle manufacturers are represented on the entry list for King of the Hill, which is restricted to 84 competitors. The most outlandish and talked-about entrant from last year was Franco Scribante with his radical, multi-winged Nissan GT-R. It relied on a unique design derived from the World Time Attack series, which was as dramatic as it was successful, handing Scribante his first victory in the Modified Saloon Car category.
He will be back to defend his title this year in the same car, although it has benefitted from a further 12 months of development after being finished just before its debut at the 2019 Simola Hillclimb. Nevertheless, Scribante is sure to face a stern challenge from three-time winner Wilhelm Baard in another wild Nissan GT-R, along with several other extremely competitive pretenders to the throne.
Reghard Roets looks set to join the fray in the Modified Saloon Cars class with a Nissan GT-R after claiming three consecutive Road-going Saloon Car and Supercar titles.
This leaves the competition open for a new winner in the road-legal class for 2020, and there will be no shortage of protagonists vying for glory in a wide range of high-performance cars from Mercedes-AMG, Porsche, Alfa Romeo, Volkswagen, Audi, Ford, Toyota, BMW, Renault, Jaguar and McLaren.
The Single Seater and Sports Prototypes category will be headlined by three-time winner Andre Bezuidenhout in the spectacular Gould GR55, which was specifically designed and developed for hillclimbs. Bezuidenhout holds the outright record for the Simola Hillclimb of 35.528 seconds with this car from the 2018 event, having recorded an average speed of 192.5 km/h – from a standing start!
The long-standing rivalry between Bezuidenhout and Robert Wolk in the Ferrari-powered A1 GP looks set to continue, with other single-seater entries coming from the Formula Ford series, as well as Formula VW and Formula GTi. There will be several sports prototype entrants too, competing in the likes of the Radical SR1 and Shelby CanAm. It’s going to be an action-packed event not to be missed!
Online ticket sales
All tickets for the 2020 Simola Hillclimb can be purchased on the event website (www.simolahillclimb.com). This includes General Entry, a strictly limited number of Pit Access tickets, Turn 2 Grandstand seating, Pit Priority parking, as well as the exclusive VIP Hospitality packages for the popular Piston Club or Le Mans VIP Hospitality suite.
Single-day and three-day passes are available – the latter offering significant savings and value for money, particularly when purchased online. Special discounts are also available when purchasing a minimum of three tickets for Classic Car Friday.
Simply access the ‘Online Tickets’ page on the Simola Hillclimb website, select your tickets, upgrades and extras, then proceed to the checkout and complete the payment – it’s as simple as that!
For more information on the event visit: www.simolahillclimb.com #SimolaHillclimb
Press Service Provided by Castrol
____________________________________________________________
Release compiled by Colin Mileman (082-897-6145 colin@milemanmedia.co.za)