Maserati headlines the Goodwood Revival with three cars it does not own
Ferrari and Maserati get a grid of their own, and the accounts already picked the winner
The Goodwood Revival runs from Friday 18 to Sunday 20 September with Maserati as its celebrated marque, a century after Alfieri Maserati drove the Tipo 26 to a class win at the 1926 Targa Florio. More than 50 pre-1966 Maseratis will race, the Lavant Cup returns as a 'Battle of Modena' for Ferrari and Maserati sports cars only, and Maserati's own display is three cars lent by the Collezione Umberto Panini.
Three Panini Collection cars: the A6GCS-53 Berlinetta, the Eldorado and the Tipo 61 Birdcage
Maserati's static display is the Berlinetta A6GCS-53, the Tipo 420M/58 Eldorado and a Tipo 61 Birdcage, all from the Collezione Umberto Panini outside Modena and presented by Maserati Classiche. They belong to the Panini family because Alejandro de Tomaso consigned the factory collection to a London auction in 1996 and Umberto Panini bought the 19 cars before they left Italy, the rescue AutoNext described last week when the Eldorado livery went on the GT2 Stradale. The A6GCS-53 Berlinetta, shown at the 1954 Turin Motor Show, is one of four Pininfarina-bodied examples and was the last Pininfarina Maserati until the 2003 Quattroporte. The Birdcage owes its name to a spaceframe of around 200 small steel tubes, and its 2.9-litre four took Stirling Moss and Dan Gurney to victory in the 1960 Nürburgring 1000 km.
The Lavant Cup's Battle of Modena is Ferrari versus Maserati, on track and in the accounts
The Lavant Cup, last run in 2023 as an all-Ferrari grid, returns on Saturday afternoon for 1950s Ferrari and Maserati sports-racers only. Maserati's side includes three A6GCS and Josef Rettenmaier's 450S, chassis 4506, an ex-works car sold to the American John Edgar in 1957 and raced by Carroll Shelby before it spent years with a Pontiac V8 and then a 6.2-litre Maserati powerboat engine. The two Modena marques are equals on that grid and nowhere else. In 2025 Maserati shipped 7,900 cars, down from 11,300, on revenue of €726 million and an adjusted operating loss of €198 million, a margin of minus 27.3 percent. Ferrari shipped 13,640 cars and made €2,110 million of operating profit, a 29.5 percent margin.
Four 250Fs, an 8C 3000 that won the 1933 French Grand Prix, and a Birdcage for Chris Harris
Goodwood has promised its largest gathering of 250Fs, the car of Fangio's 1957 title, and four of them line up in the Richmond & Gordon Trophies against rear-engined Coopers and Lotuses, driven by Michael Peet, Andy Wills, John Spiers and Brad Baker. Saturday morning's Brooklands Trophy has a lone Maserati among the Bentleys: 8C 3000 chassis 3001, one of two built, in which Giuseppe Campari won the 1933 French Grand Prix at Montlhéry and in which Baconin Borzacchini died at Monza later that year. The Goodwood Trophy fields a Tipo 26M and a 1949 4CLT, and the Sussex Trophy closes Saturday with a 1959 Tipo 61 shared by Marino Franchitti and Chris Harris.
Friday is 78 years to the day since a Maserati 4CLT won Goodwood's first race
Goodwood Motor Circuit opened on 18 September 1948, and the first Goodwood Trophy went to Reg Parnell in a Maserati 4CLT, the circuit's first Formula 1 win. The 2026 Revival opens on the same date, with Friday expanded to 13 practice sessions and two evening races, and Sunday rebuilt so that the RAC TT Celebration closes the weekend. The paddocks are dressed as post-war Sicily for the Targa Florio, and Saturday tickets and three-day passes sold out in advance.
Maserati's own 2026 racing is a GT4 GranTurismo, and its partner decision is due in December
The only new Maserati Goodwood has seen this year came in July, when the Project GT4 GranTurismo broke cover at the Festival of Speed as the brand's return to customer GT4 racing. The centenary has otherwise been marked in liveries, the Fangio 250F scheme on the GT2 at Monza and the Eldorado paint on the GT2 Stradale, plus a one-off MCPura Cielo built for the Mille Miglia. Behind it sits the industrial question: Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa said in June that the group is choosing between two partners to supply Maserati with technology, with a decision expected in December, and reports from China identify them as Huawei and JAC. Maserati's plants at Cassino and Modena are short of work, and 2025's 7,900 shipments were the brand's lowest since 2012.
AutoNext Take
The Battle of Modena is the right name for the wrong race. On the Lavant Cup grid Ferrari and Maserati start as equals; in Stellantis' 2025 accounts one of them lost €198 million on 7,900 cars while the other made €2.1 billion on 13,640. The three cars Maserati is proudest of this weekend survive because a sticker magnate outbid a London auction in 1996, and its centenary year has so far produced two paint schemes and a customer racing car, not a road car with a 2026 chassis number.
Filosa has until December to name the partner, and the Trident's centenary ends on 31 December. If the answer is Huawei software on a body welded in Hefei, Goodwood will have celebrated the 1926 Targa Florio for a brand whose next chapter is written in China, and the Revival, with its 50 Maseratis and largest-ever 250F grid, will have been the best stage the company had all year for cars it neither built recently nor owns. Goodwood announces its 2027 celebrated marque in February; by then Maserati should be able to park something new beside the Birdcage.
