The 2025 Speed Classic took place in Cape Town on 25 and 26 October. This inaugural hillclimb event was held on Philip Kgosana Drive (previously De Waal Drive). A 1,8-km section of the contour road that heads towards the Southern Suburbs served as the course for the single-car time trial event. It is reported that 15 000 petrolheads attended over the weekend. They were entertained by a diverse array of machinery and high-speed antics all weekend long with the Mother City providing a scenic backdrop to proceedings. There were a few minor incidents on the day, none which resulted in any serious injuries. We’ve pieced together a video clip of a few of the more notable whoopsies from the weekend.
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Golden Oldies
The event took place over two days. Saturday was reserved for classic cars, of which 70 entered. The cut-0ff for this was 25 years old, so any car older than that age was eligible. This allowed some not-that-old machines such as earlier Nissan GT-Rs and the like to enter. However, the oldest of these was a 1930 Bentley owned by Harry Tayler. The car was driven from the owner’s home on the other side of the mountain, competed and driven back; how cool.
There were plenty of other classics, such as performance Fords from years gone by, MGs and a rare De Tomaso Pantera in mint condition. Another oddity was a Mitsubishi Pajero Evo along with a Mazda RX-7. Of course, there were plenty of classic BMWs and a few Porsches. A few (Cape) Cobras made quick passes up the hill as well. Other classic racecars included a Formula Ford and a few Lola (replicas). The quickest machine of the day on Saturday was a classic March 79A (red car in images) that was driven by Charles Arton. He set a time of 40,14 seconds, which earned Arton the inaugural Classic Champion title.
Click here to check out our exclusive coverage of an invite-only hillclimb we attended in Italy.
Performance Road Cars
The ‘arena’ was far more packed on Sunday. The final day’s competition was a shootout for the King of the Mountain title. The array of machinery was, arguably, even more impressive on Sunday. There were plenty of contemporary performance cars such as BMW Ms of various shapes. In addition, there were no fewer than three VW Golf ClubSport S derivatives. Only 400 were made and three were competing on the same day. There were plenty of Porsches, a few Ferraris, a brace of Porsches. Lastly, the sole V12 machine of the day, a screaming Lamborghini Aventador, which seemed to be a crowd favourite.
Read our Ferrari F40 driving review at this link.
Max Power
But many people were there to see the spectacular hillclimb monsters in action. Among theses were several fire-breathing Nissan GT-Rs of various generations. There were a pair of turbocharged AWD Audis raced by brothers. In addition there were was a mad Toyota MR2 and a Lotus Exige with a Ferrari 488 engine. Lastly, there was a rare Ultima GTR with a twin-turbocharged Alfa engine. Franco Scribante set a blistering time of 35,26 seconds in his extremely powerful and completely custom Nissan GT-R to claim the King of the Mountain crown.
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