Camps Bay, Cape Town, 1962. The roar of engines echoed along Camps Bay Drive as drivers whipped their machines up through the twists and turns of the road in a bid to be the quickest of them all in this time-honoured tradition.
First held in 1912, the annual hillclimb races saw drivers showcase their cars and skills on Camps Bay Drive, Signal Hill Road and Kloof Road. One standout moment was in 1936, when a Bugatti Type 59 completed the Camps Bay course in just 53.4 seconds.
Not even the Second World War was enough to permanently derail the event. After a pause between 1941-1945, the racing resumed in 1946 with the first post-war hillclimb on Camps Bay Drive. On Saturday 30 November 1946, Roddy Turner drove his 747cc Austin to victory in the up-to-1000cc class.
But in 1962, the engines fell silent. Stricter regulations and heavier traffic volumes ended Cape Town’s hillclimb era, leaving the city’s famous roads quiet for more than 60 years.
This October that silence will be shattered. Backed by the City of Cape Town and Motorsport South Africa, Speed Classic Cape Town will revive the city’s hillclimb tradition on 25 and 26 October. For one weekend Philip Kgosana Drive, with Table Mountain as a backdrop, will transform into a 1.8km racetrack featuring nearly 150 of South Africa’s most eye-catching cars.
Day One’s ‘Classic Car Saturday’ will showcase the motoring world’s jewels, celebrating elegant design and timeless engineering. On Sunday, 26 October, modern supercars and high-performance machines will go head-to-head in the King of the Mountain showdown.
For Garth Mackintosh, Speed Classic Cape Town Event Director, there was only one choice of venue. “Philip Kgosana Drive is an iconic and beautiful piece of road that is well-suited to becoming a very fast track due to its sweeping corners overlooked by Table Mountain. It also has a return road, which is needed to bring the cars back to the pits after their run. While there are lots of great roads in Cape Town, including the ones that used to host the hillclimbs, I don’t think there is anything better suited to this particular format of hillclimb racing than Philip Kgosana Drive.”
In the early days, safety was almost non-existent. Drivers raced without seat belts, fireproof suits or crash helmets, while spectators stood just metres from speeding cars with no barriers to protect them
Fast forward over six decades later and safety is a top priority.. Spectators will still be close to the action, but this time will be separated from the cars by the same barriers used for the Formula E race held in Cape Town in 2023, to ensure maximum safety. A robust plan to ensure the safety of both competitors and spectators is also in place, with the City’s major logistical support structures, including Traffic and Disaster Management, closely collaborating with the organising team.
With strict safety measures and a diverse car and driver lineup, Speed Classic Cape Town aims to cement its place in South Africa’s motorsport fabric. “I personally love the hillclimb format and we want to grow people’s enjoyment of the sport. Speed Classic Cape Town will help make motorsport more accessible to South Africans, particularly because of its location, and spark new interest in hillclimb racing, which is an important goal of ours,” says Mackintosh.
EVENT DETAILS
Name: Speed Classic Cape Town
Dates: 25–26 October 2025
Venue: Philip Kgosana Drive, Gardens, Cape Town Distance: 1.8km from Start to Finish | Elevation Gain: 150.1m
More Info:
info@speedclassic.capetown : www.speedclassic.capetown
Facebook, Instagram, TikTok: @speedclassic.capetown | X: @speedclassic_ct
Published by Daniel Roodt
Motorsport South Africa (MSA) publishes media releases from a variety of sources on its website as a service to the sport. Due to the volume of content, it is not feasible to review or approve every release prior to publication. Some news items and articles are written by independent correspondents and may not necessarily reflect the official views or positions of MSA.