Beaulieu’s Supercar Showdown is back!

Get your diaries out, 23^rd August from 10am-6pm and write something like “Work Team-building Day??? so that the Mrs won’t commit you to a lunch with the mother in law!

Beaulieu’s Supercar Showdown is an event not to be missed, if last year is anything to go by. It started off as about 2 dozen cars, now, 5 years on it is virtually a supercar nirvana!  The Supercar Showdown is the must-see spectacular for all car lovers that brings some of the world’s most desirable and glamorous motors to Beaulieu.

I’ve got so many fond memories of going to Beaulieu with my Dad. We’d spend hours there while my Mum and sister smiled politely looking at their watches. If you want to see just about every car you have ever lusted over then it’s a great place to go. They have got static displays of over 285 cars, from the F1 racers, a Bugatti Veyron and, Ferraris galore plus a section on the cars which broke the land speed records, from the Bluebird onwards.  I really love the Top Gear sections, which has a load of cars that Clarkson, Hammond and May created and wrecked over the years. (Here’s their YouTube site if you are missing their laddish fun as much as me! www.youtube.com/user/TopGear )

Sorry, I’m running away with myself, it’s the Supercar Showdown that you want to know about!  Now be warned, Beaulieu is as much about the motor history as it is about modern supercars, so you are going to get to see 100 years’ worth of cars on their track in 10 year sections, so that you are as likely to see everything from the first 1921 Bentley to the Ferrari 458 launched earlier this year.

Last year it poured down with rain, but it was still an amazing event, I spotted;

• Bugatti Veyron – a couple of them actually
• Ferrari – cars from the 1960s onwards, man are they pretty
• Porsche – hundreds of them, bad as it sounds, there were so many of them they almost looked common, mind you, I’d still want one!
• Lamborghini – there was an Aventador, Gallardo and a Huracán
• Aston Martin – about 6 or 7 of them
• Mercedes SLS – very impressive car and man can it shift
• McLaren P1 – I think, my photo is a bit fuzzy
• Nissan GTR – for a not so “super??? looking car it made mincemeat of some of the “sexier??? looking cars

Beaulieu claim  “Supercar Showdown is a must for all supercar enthusiasts, providing an opportunity to get almost close enough to touch what most can only ever dream of owning!??? They are not wrong, it us utterly amazing, even in the rain I was in heaven.

All the cars are privately owned and it gives the owners the chance to really show off their horsepower. As a result, some of them do seem to leave as soon as they’ve done their race, which is a shame but they are there for most of the day as the modern cars race a bit later.

It’s just a brilliant event and if it keeps growing the way it has in the past 5 years it’s going to end up rivalling the Goodwood Festival of Speed in a few years’ time. Mind you, Goodwood has an amazing track so it is a very different beast.

For more info about Beaulieu and the Supercar Showdown see http://www.beaulieu.co.uk/

I’d love to see you there, but unfortunately I’m going to a Work Team-building Day!