CarFest South 2013

CarFest South 2013

I was lucky enough to attend CarFest South on the 23rd of August 2013.

CarFest was set up by Radio DJ, TV Host and Petrolhead Chris Evans for BBC's Children In Need. There is an event in the north of the country and one in the south. So far this event has made over 1.5 Million Pounds for the charity.

CarFest South is held at Jody Scheckter's farm in Laverstoke near Overton in Hampshire. Jody Scheckter is the 1979 F1 World Champion driving a Ferrari.

I set off with my dad to get to to the event early as I don't want to miss anything. We arrive in good time and when the time comes, the gates open and we are allowed in. 

Looking at the programme, we start to get an idea of how big an area that CarFest covers. There are trade stalls, car clubs showing their cars, a display arena, Silverstone Auctions are here with some interesting lots, there is a Monster Truck kitted out for passenger rides, a fun fair and a stage for the evenings entertainment. The One Show is broadcast live on the Friday night followed by live music.

The main event of CarFest is the hill climb. This year it has been extended to make it more exciting for the drivers and spectators. This year the cars going on the hill climb are grouped into sevens. 

There are Seven Iconic Cars, Seven Historic F1 Cars, Seven Anniversary Aston Martins, The Gorgeous Seven, Le Mans Seven, Unusual Seven, Super Car Seven, World Rally Championship Seven and last but by no means least, The Motorsport Seven

Walking past a huge drag racing car and a Top Gear Simulator we walk towards the paddock where the cars taking the hill climb on are kept. as some of the cars are still warming up for the hill climb and getting used to the course. I see two people that are working on Jody Scheckter's F1 cars. They are then joined by Jody Scheckter. He has a chat, has photos taken and gives autographs to those that ask. He then jumps into his Ferrari and does his warm up of the hill climb. 

After watching the last of the warm ups, it is decided that we should have a wonder around and look at the cars before grabbing some lunch and finding a good spot to watch the hill climb.

Walking around there are lots of owners clubs such as Jaguar, TVR and Lotus. There is an area of the iconic Group B Rally cars. In another stand I spot a Bugatti Veyron. There is also a charity rides stand where you can donate money to have a passenger ride on the hill climb in a supercar. 

Silverstone auctions face a vast array of vehicles that they are selling. They include a Renault van that is disguised as a Ferrari van, a Pontiac GTO a Ford Thunderbird and many more.

It's time to stop for lunch, we eat the produce from the farm, organic burger and chips with salad and it's delicious. After washing that down with some cold water we then try the beer and it's not bad. 

We then grab our spot for the hill climb and look forward to seeing the cars do battle with the course and there are some great cars here today.

What amazes me is that most of the drivers do not hold back, they really do go for it. One that did not was in a Lambroghini. The driver was trying to demonstrate the noise and speed of the car came slowly to the first bend revving the car tried to launch the car and stalled it. This gave the crowd a bit of a laugh but I expect the driver was red faced. 

The most aggressively driven cars were the rally cars and the old F1 cars. They really went for it so taking photos of these in action was not easy.

There were also cars from Jaguar, Ferrari, Aston Martin, Bugatti, Ford. Mercedes Benz, Rools Royce, McLaren, Howmet, Porsche, Koenigsegg and some home made cars that took the form of a bed and a shed.

Taking all of the action in you can't forget about he noise. All of the cars sounded great, the loudest being the F1 cars closely followed by the Le Mans cars.

They sounded great at full power. The strangest engine sound for me came from the Lexus LFA. It has a high pitch wine but it was not very loud.

Once the 63 cars had gone up the hill climb, some people left, some went to the the stage to get a good vantage point for the evenings entertainment, I waited for the paddock to open. Once opened you are free to walk around the cars, take photos and chat to the owners or drivers. We lstop at a Lambroghini Muira to admire it and take some photos. A man approaches me and asks what I think of the car. I tell him that it's beautiful and that one day I would like to own one. The man is the owner of the car and we then chat in detail about the Muira. He then asks if I would like to sit in it. How could I refuse. Once inside I find the driving position and the seat to be comfortable, but very low,  the gearstick is easy to reach and the dash is easy to read. After a couple of minutes I get out and thank the owner. 

With that we finish walking around the paddock taking more photos and then it's time to call it a day.

Today has been a great event and has been well organised. Getting parked at the event and leaving the event has been easy and it has a great atmosphere. If you have children, they will not get bored as there is plenty that they can do. 

Supercars Vs Used Cars: The Trade Off. Broadcast at 9pm on BBC 2 7thJanuary 2015

http://youtu.be/DrZPjeTXgII

This show took two used car salesmen from two very different car dealerships, one a budget dealership the other a supercar dealership and swapped them to see if they could sell cars at each other's dealerships.

They would swap where they work, their home towns and adapt there ways of living and working.

Darren Clough normally works at Compact Cars in Bridgend. This company is owned by Dave Clancy and they sell budget cars that range in price from £1,500 up to £6,000. They also operate a pay as you drive scheme for those that can't afford to pay outright. These cars are your everyday cars that people depend on made by Citroen, Ford and Volkswagen. 

Louis Leven is at the other end of the scale. Louis works at the Joe Macari Performance Car dealership in Wandsworth. Joe Macari is an ex racer with a passion for high end cars. Customers here will spend in excess of £500,000 just to buy a car as an investment. Cars for sale here include Ferrari, Maserati and Pagani.

Darren and Louis meet up at a service station to exchange information about what kind of cars they sell and other things about their lives. 

They then leave in each other's cars and make their way to their new tempory homes and places of work.

Upon arriving in London, Darren walks into a showroom of dreams. He has a quick interview with Joe Macari before being shown the stock. Darren is then taken to the archive room and shown the documents for each of the cars. Given the price tags of the cars, there is a lot of information as customers for this kind of car wants to know everything about it.

Darren is then assigned a Ferrari 250 Lusso that he has to learn about and sell to Joe Macari before he is allowed to sell cars to real customers.

With his research done Darren is then put to the test and Joe is happy to let him sell to his customers.

Upon arriving in Bridgend. Louis has a quick chat with owner Dave Clancy before being given a quick tour and put to work.

The pair struggle to get to grips with each other's ways of having to sell cars, Darren is unable to sell to Louis's wealthy car buyers and Louis approach is to soft to convince the buyers of Bridgend.

In order to help Darren, Joe Macari takes him to his restoration area where cars are brought back to their original condition. This shows Darren the passion and craftsmanship that goes into making one of these cars. Darren then went with Joe Macari to see an Aston Martin in need of restoration. Joe then asks Darren to negotiate a deal to buy the car. Darren was able to buy the car for £400,000 instead of the £425,000 asking price.

As the week goes on, Louis's sales technique adapts and he is able to sell cars to Bridgend customers.

Darren was unable to make a sale but came close on a few occasions. 

I think that this was a clever piece of television. It highlighted the difference in sales techniques needed to sell budget cars and supercars. It also highlighted lifestyle differences between Darren and Louis. Everyone featured in the programme came across as decent hardworking people.

Lastly I think that both Dave Clancy and Jo Macari were both very brave to allow the swap as they could have lost a lot of customers and money.

Mercedes Benz World C63 Driving Experience - Competition Prize From Event Tyres and Continental Tyres

I went in for a competition on Event Tyres Facebook page to win a drive at Mercedes Benz World. I was really happy when I was told I had won.

The question was who sponsors Mercedes Benz World, the answer is Continental Tyres

To give some background, Event Tyres were founded in 2003 by Mark Shankland and Gary Moloney and are a mobile tyre fitting company that come to you and fit tyres. They started with three transit vans that operated out of a Manchester depot. Event Tyres are now an award winning company with nationwide coverage.

Continental Tyres were founded in 1871 in Hanover under the name Continental-Caoutchouc- und Gutta-Percha Compagnie. Since then the company has gone from strength to strength bringing many innovations to tyres and the safety of tyres. Today they are a household brand and they are the tyre of choice on all new Mercedes Benz cars and sponsors Mercedes Benz World. Continental also manufactures several other car components.

When the day came, I set off early to avoid any traffic and to have a look around. Upon arriving at Mercedes Benz World in Weybridge roughly half an hour early, I walked through the glass doors to reception to check in and was told that Jianni Geras from Event Tyres and Dan Sheppard from Continental Tyres would arrive shortly and that I could have a look around. 

Looking around you get a sense that they have all things that a Mercedes Benz customer could wish for. On driving to the main building, I drove past an off road track for the 4x4's and the car test tracks. Inside the building they have a Mercedes Benz dealership, a service centre, a shop full of other Mercedes Benz Merchandise, a cinema, a cafe, a bistro, lots of cars with information to go with them and lots of different driving experiences. Walking around you get a sense of how important the history of Mercedes Benz is as well as what is going on with the latest models. Some of the cars that they have include a replica of Karl Benz first car, Vijay Mallya's CLK GTR, a W125 pre World War 2 car next to the car 2014 F1 car driven by Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg and 300 SL Gulwing. There is also in interesting exhibit of an F1 car that is hung by wire showing all of the car parts and how they go together.

I make my way back to the reception area and a meet Jianni Geras from Event Tyres. He greets with a big smile and handshake, we met earlier in the year at the Wilton House Classic & Supercar show.

The other competition winners have arrived and we are taken to a private suite for coffee and a safety briefing and we are then met by Dan Sheppard from Continental Tyres who gives the briefing and shows us a layout of of the test tracks. They have a beginner track, a fast track, a cone slalom and emergency stop area, a wet road area and a skid pan. 

After the briefing there is a Q&A session about Continental Tyres.

Once finished, we are taken down to the ground floor and outside to the test track. We have a group photo by the SLS AMG and one by one we are taken to our cars by the instructors. 

Today I will be driving a Mercedes Benz AMG tuned C63 and this is the most technologically advanced car I have driven. It has a 6.2 litre V8 bi turbo engine that produces 457 BHP, I have the choice of automatic or flappy paddle gearbox and there are different setups that will be explored later and the car is rear wheel drive. The breaks are carbon ceramic discs with six piston callipers.

Once strapped in I look at the dash and there is a lot to take in. I start the car and it has a very low sounding idle. I chat with my instructor and I opt to go with the flappy paddle setting. We begin by driving around the road to the learning track. This is where I get to grips with the car. Before going into the track my instructor informs me that the concrete is ok but the grass is out of bounds. To begin with everything is taken slowly so that I get to grips with the steering, breaking and gear changes. After a few laps, I am told to leave the track and make my way across to emergency stop and slalom area. Once there I pull up and the instructor tells me that on his instructions I need to go full power and when he tells me to brake as if my life depended on it. He gives the signal and I give it full power. The car lurches forward but I miss the optimum gear change to second, so when I brake, I don't get the full effect. I try again and I miss it again. This time I go fully automatic. I floor the accelerator and the car rockets with a terrific noise to 65 mph. The instructor gives the signal and I hit the breaks. With this the seatbelt tightens around me and the seat wraps around me to keep me safe. With that its massive smiles and the instructor tells me about the safety features. We then go back and where we started and then have a go at the slalom. My task this time is to go between the cones at 30mph without hitting them. I'm given the signal and I speed up to 30. Going between the cones the steering is easy but the car does feel a little clumsy. I finish and I'm told to go around for a second attempt. This time the instructor informs me that he has put the car into sport mode and I head for the cones again. This time the suspension is stiffer and the car is much easier to handle through the cones. After I navigate the cones, I'm told that the sport mode changes the gear changes, sharpens the steering and stiffens the dampers and suspension. 

We then move onto the wet road to test the ESP (Electronic Stability Programme). This in a long piece of road that has had a special coating and a sprinkler system to emulate a wet road and rain. I'm asked to pull up over one of the jets. While the car gets wet the instructor turns the traction control off and explains to me that I will pretend that I'm pulling out of a junction normally on a wet day and that I spot a car coming at me quickly and I have to put my foot down to avoid a collision. I pull out slowly and then when the signal is given I accelerate. The wheels spin, but grip quickly and I'm able to pull away safely. We go through the same thing again this time with the ESP on. I pull out, floor the accelerator the car tries to wheel spin but the computers reign the car in and I'm reduced to pulling away at a slow speed. In this situation you would have to hope the other car has good breaks.

I then make my way back to the start point again. This time I am to gather speed, take my hands off the steering wheel and break. I am given the signal and I accelerate. When the signal is given I take my hands off the wheel and break. As the car slows, the steering wheel twitches on its own and the car comes to a halt in a straight line. I'm told that this is another part of the ESP on the car. I then make my way to the fast track and to begin with for the first few laps, I get used to the track. It's quite twisty with a long back straight. Once confident I speed up to see what the car is capable and quite simply it's amazing. Going through the corners the car grips like nothing I have driven before and the acceleration is breathtaking. This is a combination of the V8 engine, tyres and technology. While on the fast track, I chat to the instructor about the tyres. Driving as I am, I would not be able to drive the same with a budget or mid range tyres on the Mercedes. The Continentals really are showing why you pay extra. Having used budget and mid range tyres, I can tell that you can push them a lot and they will grip for you. My instructor agrees. If you are still questioning why pay extra then I would ask what price do you put on safety? Of course everything has a limit and I don't want to go over the edge. On the back straight, the car really does accelerate quickly up towards 100mph before hitting the breaks and into another corner. Quite soon we stop talking and I focus on the track. After a while, the instructor asks if I'm ok, I simply smile and nod as I'm enjoying the driving.

Soon, it's time to leave the track and head for the skid pan to try some power sliding. The instructor said that in an ideal world I should rev to and hold at 3500 rpm and steer, this will give you a power slide. Sounds easy enough. I make my way onto the Skid pan. My instructor encourages me to accelerate hard and steer. I do so and very quickly lose the rear end and the car simply spins around a lot. Once it has stopped I am told to give it throttle but to hold it at 3500 RPM I do and begin to feel the car power slide. All to soon though I over rev and the car goes into a familiar spin.

After a while of mini power slides and spins it's time to hand the car and the keys back to the staff at Mercedes Benz World. 

Once reunited with our group, we make our way to the Gulwing Bistro for conversation, drinks and lunch. We discuss the fun we have had, how the cars we drive on a daily basis compared to the cars they have here the differences in tyres and much more. As we finish our food, it's time to make my goodbyes and thank you's to Jianni, Dan and the staff at Mercedes Benz World for looking after me. Today has been eye opening and has answered some questions. Firstly the cost of the car is around £70,000. Having put it to the test I can understand why. It drives beautiful and feels like it's on rails through corners. The engine and the noise will give any driver a smile. I had no idea about ESP, this was both good and bad. Personally I would prefer a bit of wheel spin if it avoids a crash but I can understand why it's here and the pros outweigh the cons. The stability it gives the car and the decisions it makes about where braking is needed most is groundbreaking technology.