Kent based JOTA Sport have received a personal invitation from the Earl of March to attend next weekend’s Goodwood Festival of Speed.

Lord March has issued the late invitation following the British team’s stunning success in the recent Le Mans 24 Hours endurance sportscar race.

The small but dedicated team, based on the Kent/Sussex border, won the LM P2 category and finished an incredible fifth overall – the only British team with an all-British driver crew to achieve success in this year’s race (14-15 June).

It marks the first time for 10 years three English drivers sharing the same car have achieved such a top placing at Le Mans.

The Zytek was originally built in Derbyshire while the car runs on tyres produced at Fort Dunlop in Birmingham.

Businessman and part-time racer Simon Dolan plus professional drivers Harry Tincknell – racing at Le Mans for the very first time – and Oliver Turvey, competing in the annual French marathon for only the second time after a late call up from the team, steered their JOTA Sport Zytek Z11SN to LM P2 category honours in the 82nd running of the gruelling twice-around-the-clock sportscar endurance race in France.

The Dolan/Tincknell/Turvey Zytek clocked up 356-laps equating to 3,016-miles at an average speed of 125.14mph in the world’s toughest sportscar race.

Speaking about the invitation, Simon Dolan is delighted to be given the opportunity to drive at such an historic location:

“I’ve been to the Festival a couple of times before but only as an interested spectator. This will be the first time I’ve been there as a ‘driver’. I have no idea what it’ll be like driving our Zytek up the hill and so I think I’ll be taking it nice and slowly and just revel in the glory rather than go for a time!

“To be invited there as Le Mans champions will seem surreal I’m sure – it’s only just starting to sink in that we won, so to be at Goodwood celebrating again, a British team with British drivers in a British car will be very, very special.”

Dolan, Tincknell and Turvey will take turns behind the wheel of the Zytek during the course of the annual event while David Clark, like Dolan a JOTA Group partner, will drive his Harrods McLaren F1 GTR.

Another British success story, this particular McLaren finished third and sixth at Le Mans in 1995 & ’96 respectively. Britain’s Le Mans “legend” Derek Bell drove the McLaren on both occasions and led the race for 11 hours in ’95 – another example of the F1 GTR going on to win the race that year.

Bell was re-united with the famous McLaren at Goodwood while 1980 Formula One World Champion plus American former television late show host Jay Leno have also driven it on the hillclimb.

The Festival of Speed is an annual hill climb featuring historic motor racing vehicles held in the grounds of Goodwood House, West Sussex. Visitors can expect to see cars and motorbikes from over 100 years of worldwide motor racing history climb the hill, including many of the latest F1 machines. Aside from the machines, the event attracts a host of names from the past and present of motor racing, offering a rare chance to see world-famous names driving a wide range of cars.