The 2019 Goodwood Festival of Speed had no shortage of memorable moments. On its own, the hill climb event was one of the hottest tickets over the weekend, and at least one vehicle made sure everyone got their money’s worth. For the record, the Jaguar F-Type is a great sports car. It boasts an angry 5.0-liter supercharged V-8 engine that’s lively and relatively fuel-efficient at the same time. It handles like a charm, and it’s poised and responsive on the road. The F-Type is the type of performance model that has few, if any, weaknesses. Unfortunately, one of those weaknesses is getting driven around a course…on two wheels. No sports car should be subjected to such inane gimmickry, and yet, there it was, a Jaguar F-Type, getting driven around the Goodwood hill climb on two wheels. It didn’t take long for something to go wrong, but, hey, at least the F-Type finished the hill climb, even if it was coughing and wheezing in the end.

I’m well aware of the fact that the Goodwood Festival of Speed’s hill climb event isn’t a serious competition. It’s more of a fun showcase for a lot of automakers, particularly when it comes to new models. Oddball vehicles, trucks, and what-have-you’s also compete in the hill climb event. We’ve seen an “autonomous” Ford Mustang compete in the event. We’ve seen a NASCAR-spec Toyota Tundra truck. Let’s not forget about the Honda Mean Mower V2. Heck, we even saw a Range Rover finish the course last year on two wheels.

At least until the said F-Type conks out because of it.

Ok, so “conk out” is a bit harsh to describe what happened to the F-Type that just finished the Goodwood hill climb on two wheels. Driver Terry Grant even managed to complete the course after starting his lap by driving on a ramp to help get the F-Type onto two wheels. There are a number of hairy moments when the F-Type appeared to be in the verge of tipping over, but Grant, to his credit, managed to hold his nerves and keep the F-Type balanced on two wheels throughout the whole stretch of the run. Unfortunately, no car, not even a Jaguar F-Type, was built on the principle of two-wheeled driving, and right around the middle part of Grant’s drive — it’s at the 2:47 part of the video — a plume of smoke puffs out of the rear section of the F-Type. Only a few seconds later when the camera focuses on the sports car’s underbody do we see that the smoke was coming from the F-Type’s rear differential. Even if you don’t expect it to happen, there is a part of in all of us that understands the inevitability of mechanical issues whenever a car is being driven on two wheels.

Watching this video reminded us of that. But the inevitable still happened, and, by the looks of it, it appears that the rear differential wasn’t receiving even distribution of lubrication, allowing the dry part of the component to overheat. Another massive plume of smoke comes out of the F-Type towards the end of the video. That could’ve been the result of fluid hitting the section of the differential that was already overheated. These are the issues that you have to consider whenever you decide to drive your car on two wheels. Not that we’re encouraging it because we’re not. But these mechanical issues will happen, especially if the car itself gets overextended to achieve a result.

Hopefully, the issues with the F-Type aren’t as bad as we think they are. It’s never a good sign to see a plume of smoke come out of a car’s underbody, and, for a fleeting second, I was actually afraid that the part of the Jag sports car would catch fire. The good news is that it didn’t happen. Apart from the smoke and the anticipated damage to the rear differential, this particular F-Type survived its hill climb run on two wheels. I wouldn’t have subjected the F-Type to that kind of racing environment, but the fans in attendance who caught the stunt live seems to eat it all up.

On that end, I wouldn’t have expected anything less. This is, after all, still the Jaguar F-Type. Sure, a refreshed model is on the pipeline, though an exact timetable has yet to be announced. The latter can be tuned to produce anywhere from 488 horsepower to almost 600 horsepower. If the new F-Type does benefit from a Bimmer-sourced, twin-turbo V-8 engine, expect it to carry an output covering the whole range of outputs available to the BMW-spec V-8 unit.

As it is, current versions of the F-Type that are powered by the incumbent supercharged V-8 can produce anywhere from 488 horsepower to 567 pound-feet of torque. Switching to a BMW-sourced twin-turbocharged V-8 hits those output sweet spots, too.

Then again, all of this can be discussed at another time. For now, it’s all about the Jaguar F-Type that made quite an impression at the 2019 Goodwood Festival of Speed. I admit that seeing it run on two wheels around the Goodwood hill climb isn’t as weird as seeing the Range Rover do it a year ago. But it’s still weird when you consider that the F-Type, as Jag’s one-true performance car, is meant to be driven on four wheels, not two.

Here’s to hoping that jacked up rear differential can be fixed without much cost to the rest of the car.

Jaguar F-Type specifications

Further Reading

Read up more about the 2018 Jaguar F-Type

Read our full review on the 2018 Jaguar F-Type SVR.