XPOSURE by VMAG Looking for XPOSURE? Join the Club!Some people spend a long weekend braai’ing… others close a mountain and launch racing cars at it like they’re late for judgment day.
Welcome to the 16th running of the Simola Hillclimb… the loudest reason Knysna’s birds have considered emigration since 2009.
From humble beginnings with 1 500 spectators to a 2025 crowd of 20 244, this Garden Route gem has gone from “local jol” to full-blown international petrol pilgrimage. And not the polite kind. The kind where supercars scream, single-seaters spit fire, and Dik Frik insists his bakkie could “also do that if the turbo was sorted”.
Let’s get something straight… this isn’t just quick. It’s officially the world’s fastest hillclimb.
The 1.9 km stretch up Simola Hill has a current record of 34.161 seconds. From a standing start. At an average speed of 200.228 km/h. Two hundred. Uphill. Which means by the time you’ve said “goeie donner”, Andre Bezuidenhout has already reached the top in his Gould GR55 and is asking for another go.
For perspective, the 1.9 km Goodwood Festival of Speed in the UK… yes, that one with tea, tweed and very British applause… clocks an average record speed of 175 km/h. Impressive. But Simola is basically saying, “Hold my Castle Lager.”
Of course, this madness doesn’t just materialise because someone found a steep road and a stopwatch.
Planning for this thing starts 12 to 18 months before engines even fire. The organising team debriefs the day after each event. No rest. No “see you next year”. Just clipboards, meetings with Motorsport South Africa, emergency services, municipality officials, sponsors… and probably very strong coffee.
By October the year before, changes are being mapped out. Two months before the event, the build begins. And when we say build… we mean transform-a-normal-road-into-a-mini-Formula-1-bunker build.
In 2025 alone, they installed:
- 67 FIA-spec concrete barriers with catch fencing
- Over 7 000 used tyres strapped together with 1.4 km of stainless steel strapping
- 41 apex markers bolted into the tar
- 73 km of additional speed and safety fencing
- 2 153 m² of decks and grandstands with 800 proper seats
- 43 marquees covering 2 587 m²
- 22 pits housing up to 84 cars
- 13 containers for timing, livestream, offices and enough refrigeration to keep the VIP area smiling
This is not a hill. It’s a temporary motorsport city.
Then there are the gladiators.
Classic Car Friday brings 65 competitors across 10 classesfor machinery up to 2005. Proper old-school thunder. Franco Scribante has seven Classic Conqueror titles… seven. At this point the trophy cabinet needs its own postcode.
King of the Hill ups the dosage. Eighty-four competitors. Twenty-five classes. Three categories ranging from road-going saloons and supercars to modified monsters and single-seater sports prototypes that look like they escaped from Le Mans at midnight.
Over three days, there are more than 1 400 timed runs. Warm-ups, practice, qualifying, class finals, Top 10 shootouts… it’s basically motorsport CrossFit.
Andre Bezuidenhout holds six winsin the Single Seater and Sports Prototype category. Scribante has five King of the Hill wins, including two overall titles. JP van der Walt has four in the road-going and supercar division. These okes don’t just attend… they collect silverware like Woolies points.
Behind the scenes, it’s military-level organisation… but with more rev limiters.
- Six full-time and 31 part-time Simola staff.
- 12 Motorsport South Africa officials.
- 14 track marshals across seven marshal points.
- 25 pit lane marshals.
- Seven medical, fire and rescue personnel on site.
- 90 safety and security staff per day.
And that’s before you count the 550-plus mechanics and crew in the pits who treat torque settings like sacred scripture.
Now here’s where it gets properly modern.
Simola didn’t just build a hillclimb… it built a global audience. The livestream, introduced in 2017 and expanded to full three-day coverage since 2019, is beamed to 120 countries.
In 2025 alone, 546 000 viewers tuned in… 54% international, 46% proudly South African. That translated into more than 5.7 million minutes viewed during the event and a staggering 75 million minutes across YouTube and Facebook. Add in over five million website hits in May and millions of “Hillclimb Monsters” video views, and suddenly this little Knysna weekend looks less local and more global spectacle.
And yet… it still keeps its flavour.
There’s the street parade and Fan Fest drawing more than 5 000 spectators. There’s the mix of Ferraris, wild single-seaters, home-built turbo monsters and pristine classics. There’s the mountain air. The sea breeze. The smell of hot brakes, boerewors and skaap tjops.
It’s motorsport wrapped in lifestyle. Fast cars against postcard scenery. Engineering insanity with a side of coastal charm.
From 30 April to 3 May 2026, it all happens again.
Same hill. Bigger bragging rights.
In Knysna, going uphill at 200 km/h isn’t reckless… It’s tradition.