Autosport Show Saturday 14th January 2017

There's nothing much good about the month of January is there?! Christmas and the New year celebrations are a rapidly fading memory, the bank balance is rapidly shrinking and the waistline is rapidly expanding. One way of breaking up the mid-winter gloom and doom is to go to the annual Autosport International show at the NEC near Birmingham....so I duly did!
With the NEC charging £12 to park your car these days, I made the decision to travel by train early on Saturday morning which having done some Maths probably turned out to be the slightly cheaper travel option....
I've always preferred to see racing cars on track and in a racing situation. Watching testing has never really appealed and although Museum's are very interesting and worthy, a stationery,silent racing car is a curious beast. The main reason for going to the show for the second consecutive year was to garner as many fixture lists as possible from clubs, circuits and organisers in a bid to try and make sense of the 2017 UK motorsport fixture list!
That many stalls and exhibits featured scantily clad ladies wearing lycra catsuits may have also helped my attendance to the show too.......not that I pay attention to such things!
The show's centrepiece is a Live Action show which I thought was a disappointment this year compared to last year's. The oval shaped circuit inside one the NEC's cavernous halls lands itself to oval racing action but there were only 3 genuine races for Brisca F1 and a couple of Grasstrack classes. They certainly raced "hard" as 2 grasstrackers collided and speared into the concrete barrier! It was definitely more show than racing this year though. An electric GT car circulated a few times with absolutely no spectacle. A poor BTCC driver shootout with Dave Newsham driving a Ginetta around a figure of eight course. Stunt driver Terry Grant performing a few tricks which culminated in a loop the loop stunt. Slightly better was a celebration of 50 years of Rallycross in which Liam Doran's antics were very entertaining. I left the hall thinking that the hour long show could have been better and should have showcased a few more oval racing classes.
The Oval racing section of the show itself seemed to be a lot quieter this year. As is always the case, oval racing promoters and tracks had plenty of fixture lists ready for public distribution something which the circuit racing branch of the sport should take note. No Silverstone presence at the the show at all, MSV were there but no fixture list. Understandable as they had just announced the take-over of Donington Park so their plans must be affected. Great news for regular spectators at Donington I feel and look forward to visiting MSV-run Donington in 2017.
All of the UK's main organising clubs had decent sized stands and the BRSCC, BARC and 750MC all showcasing the fact that at grass roots/club level, the sport is in a healthy state.
I spent quite a while at the Autosport Stage where two of Scotland's greatest racing drivers were interviewed separately. Dario Franchitti pictured here

 
 and Allan McNish here. Both men very articulate and entertaining. Henry Hope-Frost doing the interviews, a man whose enthusiasm for all things motor sport saw him on the Bruce Forsyth game show You Bet many years ago in a Grand Prix question bet!

The Williams Grand Prix cars in the photo were part of a large display at the show by the team. A mock up 70's style pit garage housed the FW06 whilst the modern day FW38 was on show in a laboratory style 10's garage!

On display was James Hunt's 1975 Dutch GP winning Hesketh

and this fantastic display of Lotus Grand Prix cars.

The modern day Formula One car is not an aesthetic piece of machinery and couldn't resist taking this photo....

The arse of a Haas....

Overall I would say that the show in it's current format caters more for the casual motorsport fan rather that the died in the wool enthusiast. Hardly any book stalls and no Duke DVD stall indicate that selling your wares at the show is a thing of the past. The Internet and increasing stall hire fees now mean that the show is more a means to display your product, network for business and provide a platform for exposure to the outside world. After two consecutive years I will probably give the show a miss next year...at £36 for admission it's difficult to justify the cost. I did pick up 2 free pens though and a carrier bag full of fixtures and info!