[socram]

C'mon guys, don't blame a classic meeting for the poor crowd at Taupo and don't you dare suggest that our annual Classic meeting on Auckland's anniversary weekend should be canned!

Just for the uninitiated, the owners of Hampton Downs are now the promoters of that January meeting and have been since we (MGCC) handed it over to them three years ago, so that they could have two weekends on the trot with F5000s before the South Island's popular Southern Festival of Speed. It has been and will remain one of the top meetings of the year for the classic brigade.

We even lent you the Muscle Cars to pad out the A1GP programme!


Face facts. The people who go to the F5000 meetings are not normally that interested in the more modern stuff. There was a great grid of Formula Juniors and historics in addition to the other classes, making 12 grids in all and a 36 race programme over the two days, run brilliantly and in fine weather, all finished by 5pm Sunday.

As a trackside apartment owner at Hampton Downs, I will not be using the apartment if A1GP does get to HD, as I would rather watch the event on TV. I am not really interested in any one/two make racing, whether it be A1GP, the Toyota race series, Holden/Ford V8s, Utes or saloons etc.


A1GP and Classics generally cater for two distinct groups of spectators and we have enough problems getting race dates as it is, with Hampton Downs and Pukekohe already fully booked for the next 12 months. Classic racing is booming and although I agree with the concept of A1GP, a lot of damage was done by the attitude of the circuit last year with overly zealous security stopping people bringing water into the circuit!

We have had a successful classic meeting at Pukekohe for the last ten years so if we get 300 cars and a fairly full grandstand for a $25 weekend ticket, and offer a great spectacle and full grids, why should we suffer? I have never been a fan of meetings that run to the clock with a lot of wasted time and Taupo is too far away for a day trip.

HD has NOT in any way sabotaged A1GP at Taupo and to suggest they have, shows a lack of understanding of the structure of motorsport and the fickleness of the general public, who, by and large, are not purists. Read other messageboards as I have done and you will have seen considerable disenchantment with last year's event from ther locals.

The fact that drivers from the UK, USA, Denmark Canada and Australia head to NZ for the classic series', shows just how strong the classic and historic scene is. It is not beset by financial wranglings and the need for people like Colin Giltrap to keep digging into their own pockets for survival.