>>> TAKE ME TO IT<<<

>>>TAKE ME TO IT<<<

Do you remember those posters that you use to have on your bedroom wall when you were a wee lad? I’m not taking the ones of the female form I’m talking mid engined Italian sports cars. That’s right the stuff that all boys dream of, outrageous spoilers, mad body lines and engine sounds to die for.

Well the every day chap on the street could never and will never afford these types of rides, so the only real way to get close to such machines is the Auto Italia show.

Held at Brooklands the show was a cracking day out, the weather was scorching and so too were the cars on display. I think that it is safe to say that I have never seen so many Ferrari’s, Lambo’s and Maserati’s of all eras on display in one go. And to top that off, some real classic thrown into the mix such as Abarth 131’s, Lancia Integrale, Stratos, Cheeky little Fiat 500’s alongside some of the more modern stuff such as Fiat Uno’s, Punto’s, Coupes and a shed load of Alfas. As you could imagine the Italian car owners can be as passionate as any other, even if they are said to be a constant battle to keep on the road. But blood, sweat and tears aside, I think if you asked any owner, be it of a Lambo, Ferrari, Maserati, Fiat, Lancia or Alfa they would all reply with a “Yes it is all worth it” or “I just can’t live with out it” or something else along those lines.

The show was spread out all around Brooklands and did have a lot to fill the day up with, most of the show was static, however the hill climb did pull in the crowds with a real mixture of examples tackling the incline. Overall a real great day out full of the cars of your dreams.

UK CRUISING DEAD! …..well that is debatable.

Having not been to a cruise for a few years, it was assumed that the UK cruise scene was either dead or simply just not worth worrying about.

This weekends RobinHood Rally had been cancelled so an opening in the calender had arisen. We got wind of the Revenge Cruise going down is East London so thought that it would be rude not to.

A short 45 miles blast for us and as we converged on the location we just knew that we were going to be pleasantly surprised. A 30 minute que to get into the selected retail park (a cruise hot spot of years gone by) attracted the local fuzz in no time, but what do they do with a thousand odd boy racers? have them tearing up the public roads or simply let them get on with what they do?

Eventually we got parked up and had a bit of a gander, in amongst the mainly not so interesting rides was a wide selection of hot metal, Jap Tuner, Show, Euro, Track Slag to even the odd Rat look. I think this night attracted a good mix of all of these and gave the night something for everyone. A couple of crowd pleaser’s were a couple of mint super cars in the forms of Lambo’s, and for 90s lovers, a lovely example of a mint RST (pictured above). Amongst the mutton dressed as lamb there was a few honeys floating about, some wannabe models hoping to hit the bit time, others far from pleasing to the eye.

As far as the atmosphere goes at cruises, this night had small pockets dotted about the place, with the odd burnout or two cropping up. The usual banging sound systems pelted out various flavours of urban music, some systems performed well, others just a mass of distortion. As the night moved on an incident sparked off a mass attendace from the met, we were even treated to a UFO flying over head beaming down it’s search light, and with this time was getting on for midnight, this in-sighted a mass charge for the exits.

All in all this was good night out, after not being sure of what to expect, we were pleasantly surprised at not both the turnout, but the range of what was on show, maybe just maybe there is hope for the UK cruise scene?