London, 23-26 February, 2017

Two shows for the price of one! As an entry ticket for one automatically gave you access to the other. Both interesting in their own rights, and both under one roof although in separate halls of the Excel exhibition centre in East London, with a bonus of plentiful visitor parking at a reasonable daily rate, good transport links via the Docklands Light Railway to the centre of London and transport link hubs, with London City Airport also close by for international visitors. The 3rd running of the London Classic Car Show followed the format of its predecessors, with the central Grand Avenue down the centre of the hall, with feature and dealer displays either side of it, and the Grand Avenue Club overlooking the turning circle at the top end. This year the demonstration car run paddock was open to visitors between runs, so that they could view them in closer detail between runs, which effectively added a whole new display area to the show.

The Historic Motorsport International Show was held on the opposite side of the main concourse through the exhibition centre, which features a variety of restaurants and bars to suit most tastes and pockets. This was this show’s maiden venture, and despite the date clash with the well established Race Retro show some 80 miles up the road near Coventry, it attracted a healthy array of displays, vendors and car clubs, to make for a broad based and interesting show. The show was officially opened by Belgian racing legend Jacky Ickx at midday on the Thursday, whilst there were a number of famous motor racing names in attendance and either being interviewed or in discussions on the Supagard Theatre stage, including Jurgen Barth, Derek Bell, Jackie Oliver and Emanuele Pirro.

This show featured displays from a number of classic event organisers, like Peter Auto from France, organisers of the Tour Auto, the Chantilly Concours, the Le Mans Classic and a number of other events. Then there was Masters Historic Racing, who organise international race meetings for classic 3 litre F1 cars, including current F1 support races, together with sports cars, through their FIA Masters Historic F1 and FIA Masters Historic Sports Car Championships, along with other series. The Silverstone Classic event, incorporating the Scarf & Goggles pub, had an impressive display, as did Hall & Hall, featuring a number of F1 cars, including a Matra F1 car together with a Matra sports racing car, whilst FORCE featured the proposed Bahamas Motor Speedway, and also had a fine array of classic F1 cars, including a rarely seen Dallara BMS as driven by Emanuele Pirro who kindly posed for photographs with his old warhorse.

Other features of the show were a Coys Auction, with predominantly competition orientated cars on offer, together with a pair of wild Koenig confections on BMW and Mercedes-Benz originals, then there were a number of one-make car clubs, whilst the 96 Club had an impressive display, which included a Ferrari GTO (288) and a F40. There were also numerous race support specialists and a Beaulieu Pop-Up Autojumble, so the show encompassed a wide variety of offerings fo visitors, and that was without crossing the concourse to the London Classic Car Show.

If the concurrent Race Retro show at Stoneleigh was rally car heaven, then the London Classic Car Show was Ferrari Heaven. There were two main displays, one being a sextet of cars driven by Jacky Ickx during his varied career from F1, through sports cars and into rallying, including a Ferrari 312 B2 F1 car. The other main feature display was a celebration of Ferrari’s 70th anniversary at the opposite end of the hall, with a wide ranging selection of Ferrari road cars from the sixties to date, with a fifties 375 MM added for good measure, the curator of which was Joe Macari, whose company also had a stand a short distance away with further Ferraris and other offerings available. The star attraction of the display was Nick Mason’s 250 GTO, whilst as if one 250 GTO at the show wasn’t enough, GTO Engineering had another one on display on their stand, further up on the opposite side of the Grand Avenue. Apart from the main Ferrari display there were numerous other examples on dealer stands, including a 212 Inter Vignale Coupe displayed by Samuel Laurence, and at the other end of the spectrum a LaFerrari Aperta displayed on Incarnation Vehicle Solutions stand, whilst there was also a Ferrari class in the paddock, featuring in the Grand Avenue Parade.

Lest it be thought that the show was only about Ferrari, there were also plenty of other marques spread around the hall and in the parade paddock, including an impressive array of Aston Martins on the Aston Martin Works stand, with the Corgi Toys stand featuring the DB10 from the James Bond film Spectre., which obviously caught the eye of the younger generation, no doubt doing quite well on sales of the scale model. Over the course of the weekend the joint shows attracted over 37,000 visitors, which is over 11% up on the 2016 attendance figure, showing that it is going from strength to strength, and that the classic car continues to be a popular attraction to motoring enthusiasts.

Keith Bluemel
03/2017