Have now got the car back from the paint shop so will be there on Saturday if I can be added to the list please

1, Nismo
2, technics
3, blueboyracer
4, Clintos (Teesside)
5, N3DSD
6, Davep (Essex)
7, Serg1
8, Thunderbox
9, Gunzi
10, DaveG (Doorstep wink )
11, CC
12, decoy133
13, AnnieMac
14, PeteP
15, BarmyBob (Possibly)
16, GaryW (+1)
17, Burty
18, Robcal (Essex)
19, barrygadd2003
20, barnacle
21, jame5
22, Lappers

1, Nismo
2, technics
3, blueboyracer
4, Clintos (Teesside)
5, N3DSD
6, Davep (Essex)
7, Serg1
8, Thunderbox
9, Gunzi
10, DaveG (Doorstep wink )
11, CC
12, decoy133
13, AnnieMac
14, PeteP
15, BarmyBob (Possibly)
16, GaryW (+1)
17, Burty
18, Robcal (Essex)
19, barrygadd2003
20, barnacle
21, jame5
22, Lappers
23, arm

What time do you all intend to arrive? I think I will get there around 12 noon so we can drive straight in. I just read this on the Brooklands site:

"talian cars should enter the Museum site via the Campbell Gate off Brooklands Road (with a fast access lane for ticket holders). If the Museum site is full, Italian cars will be re-directed to public parking areas, which are in The Heights off Wellington Way with overflow parking in the Community Park if required with park and ride buses - please follow event signage. Please note that there will be no parking in the Museum’s normal visitor car park at Mercedes-Benz World for this event.

NB: entry on to the site via the Campbell Gate for Italian cars will be restricted from 11.30am until 1pm due to movement of track cars for the demonstration at Mercedes-Benz World"

Is Brooklands signed from the M25?

I will be attending too.

Don't think Brooklands is signposted from the M25 but gates open to exhibitors at 8am and the event is open to the public from 10am. I would say from previous experience, most Coupes arrive before 10am so would suggest 12 is probably a bit late because 12 until 1 is the time Auto Italia has use of the MB track.

As Lappers says, 12 is a bit late. The entrance gets very busy indeed with long queues after 10 am.

With all the changes currently being done on the Brooklands site, space is very much at a premium and I would not be surprised if late comers do not get put with the rest of the group. Instead they could well be shunted off to an overflow zone.

For these reasons I would try to arrive earlier if you possibly can.

If you come off the M25 at junction 10 follow the A3 towards London for half a mile, come off at the slip road take the first turn off the roundabout (A245, signposted Weybridge I imagine), cross the traffic lights in 600 yards or so, then continue on that road until the next roundabout where you turn right onto the B374. It is signposted from there. make sure not to follow the signs to "The Heights" instead carry straight on at that roundabout up the hill and you will see a sign on the left pointing to where Italian cars need to go. That small road leads to the Campbell Gate.

You can also come off the M25 at junction 11 and come in via Weybridge or Addlestone , but those routes are more convoluted.

https://goo.gl/maps/TxMJaVaPyW22

Jan and I will be arriving early doors with Countrycruising

Looking forward to finally meeting some of you guys

I'm bringing mine too so please add me to the list.

Excellent Tim, it'll be nice not to be the only 16NA around the place

1, Nismo
2, technics
3, blueboyracer
4, Clintos (Teesside)
5, N3DSD
6, Davep (Essex)
7, Serg1
8, Thunderbox
9, Gunzi
10, DaveG (Doorstep wink )
11, CC
12, decoy133
13, AnnieMac
14, PeteP
15, BarmyBob (Possibly)
16, GaryW (+1)
17, Burty
18, Robcal (Essex)
19, barrygadd2003
20, barnacle
21, jame5
22, Lappers
23, arm
24, Tim16V

I beg to differ, the official times posted on the Brooklands website are:

So get there as early as you can!

Hi everybody, I'm sorry but I am not going to be able to make it tomorrow. My friend who was coming with me is a carer for his wife who has dementia and unfortunately she can't be left at the moment because she is unwell. I don't feel up to coming by myself.

So! If anyone would like my 2 advance tickets - free! - just send me your email address and I will forward them to you. I will send them to the first person who replies. Be a shame to waste them.

All the best and have a blast!
Anne

(I have sent my tix to Jim.)

Sorry - not Jim, JOE (Country Cruising)

Received, thanks

Hello,

I shall be there too...

1, Nismo
2, technics
3, blueboyracer
4, Clintos (Teesside)
5, N3DSD
6, Davep (Essex)
7, Serg1
8, Thunderbox
9, Gunzi
10, DaveG (Doorstep wink )
11, CC
12, decoy133
13, AnnieMac
14, PeteP
15, BarmyBob (Possibly)
16, GaryW (+1)
17, Burty
18, Robcal (Essex)
19, barrygadd2003
20, barnacle
21, jame5
22, Lappers
23, arm
24, Tim16V
25, Bravepants

p

Somehow managed to pull a muscle in my shoulder and can't see any way I can make tomorrow now unfortunately. If anybody wants 2 free tickets then please PM me and I will pass them on.

Hope it's a great day

Good to catch up with everyone and meet some new members too , i hope everyone got home safe and sound

Oh and jake dont forget to book your driving test asap .

I had a great day out, went up the hill twice and this year remembered to brake before I got to the top.

I counted 30 Coupes around the site so it was another good turn out!

The pics I've seen looked great, so wish I could have been there.

Great turn out too

I liked this interesting Alfa 155...

I don't think you missed a lot, Richard... the event as a whole was not as advanced as a shambles. On the basis of today's effort I'm not planning on going back.

I've done a dozen shows here, and every time, there has been a defined area for each club, or at least for most types. Today? A car park with a lot of Italian cars in it. I ended up parked next to a Renault, for Pete's sake.

And don't even mention the queues: half an hour to the motorway junction, an hour and a half to the site. I'd suggest to the organisers that they need a third gate: one for people who've pre-paid their tickets.

And they should be liaising with the clubs to know numbers beforehand, allocate space, and limit it; other cars to a general park perhaps. As it was, if you didn't have a Ferrari, a Lambo, or a Maserati, it was pot luck where you ended up - and even some of those guys ended up parked randomly.

On the other hand, good to meet up again the few I met - hi guys!

Oh heck Neil that's not a good review.
"Farming" in Norfolk wasn't too bad after all then lol
I even managed to take a closer look at my 16v, have LOADS of bits to replace/service now :-O

I didn't think Pete asked you to do that did he?

I've been to this event every year since it started as the "Italian Car Day" at Syon Park, via Gaydon, and settling on Brooklands for goodness knows how many years now. Unfortunately much of the area resembles a huge building site with uneven/unfinished surfaces, metal fencing and very few grass areas left due to the large new hangers going up, and much of the concrete roadways are in not much better condition than the crumbling old track. The main Coupe area was reasonably well defined but once we had a dozen cars together any others had to park randomly next to other Italian cars (there was also the odd Renault, Audi, even a Bristol ) Perhaps it will be better when the work on the "start/finish straight" (leading from the clubhouse/bottom of test hill up to the middle bit of banked track) is complete, but unless they add some grass verges it will still resemble a car park. The (old) 500s managed to bag an area near the old Brooklands sign, and the Abarths were together in an area of actual car park (and I missed them until right at the end when most had already left), but the event felt more cramped for space than ever before. I arrived a 8:30 and queues were already quite long with no "fast lane" for pre-paid tickets, for some reason it was worse this year? I didn't bother going to the MB World track because spectating there is a bit of a joke, and didn't bother to watch cars going up the test hill either. For me Brooklands lost its appeal some years ago, but as a place to see some rare and unusual cars, be amused at the antics of others (take a bow Lambo owners, and that Uno owner ) and catch up with old friends, it's still good. But like many people I only go in the museum to use the loo or buy a drink, so the entrance fee can seem a bit steep.

Pics to follow.

What frustrated me was that I followed the directions to a tee. Arrived at the roundabout at 8:15 and then queued for an hour and a quarter. Three cars around me broke down and were pushed into the David Lloyd place. Turns out they were letting in cars from the opposite direction as priority, meaning the 'correct' way was far too slow.

The people directing had no clue either, I was told to park between the Lancia's before seeing a better spot.

Top tip though - the loos in the bus museum were always completely empty, so no waiting there!

I concur with al that has been said..I went last year ..a really enjoyable event ...this year..a bit of a shambles..and apart from the older Ferraris ( I still lust after a Dino) not much worth queuing for

After having returned from Brooklands yesterday I thought I’d wait until this morning to post and see what others had said before committing keyboard to internet. I always wonder if it is me when I seem to think things are a total shambles and perhaps others can see only good things.

However…. Neil, DaveG , Robcal and n3dsd all voice what I think too. Even that paragon of virtue, PeteP was heard to use the odd profanity when describing events yesterday! Brooklands has always been a dusty old home for ancient relics; aviation, automobile and human and they have always given the impression that ‘normal’ people and their cars are there under sufferance and that, as far as Italian cars are concerned, there is really only ‘proper room’ for collectable Ferraris, Lamborghinis and rare and fabulous cars of exquisite provenance. Indeed, the Parc Fermé area by the club house is (and was) an area of interest- except this year Auto Italia’s best patrons of advertising space had a ‘showroom’ for their latest tantalising offers and very few of what I might call great and interesting cars were on display.

This year, clearly the whole area has been affected by the building works and space was always going to be at a premium. Instead of either declaring the event cancelled for the year, or, restricting the numbers, Auto Italia has almost abrogated their responsibility and instead of upping their organisation, they appear to have just ‘given up’ and let the whole thing dissolve into chaos!

Areas for model types should have been negotiated with the clubs (including ours) and properly reserved (with a restriction on numbers as necessary), marshals briefed on who goes where and Uno Turbo revving riff-raff confined to the outer extremities of Weybridge!

I am not sure that Brooklands, which is a registered charity and a museum dedicated to aviation as well as cars and planes take a lot of space, is really going to have any space left after it has built more sheds to host the Auto Italia event ‘properly’. Such an event needs (and had until fairly recently at Brooklands) space to congregate the marques of Italian car in organised displays, room to have pertinent traders and exhibitions and ‘something to watch or do’. With the redevelopment of Brooklands and the increasing wealth and popularity of Mercedes Benz cars with their own track reluctantly ‘leased’ for the limited time, I fear that this location is no longer watch they (or we) need.

I have been going to Brooklands for ten years now and until fairly recently, really looked forward to the event as a chance to meet members, look at great cars and generally soak up the atmosphere. As time has gone on there are now far less Fiat Coupes in attendance (or indeed on the road), I have seen most of the ‘exotics’ many, many times and there is currently no atmosphere to soak up! As Neil said, we just turned up in a car park with a bad road surface and wondered around a bit. It would have been better to hire Tesco Weybridge, shut the store and use their car park. On the level, great road surface and conveniently located.

I will definitely give it a miss next year (at least) to see if, post-construction, the event can salvage its reputation as the premier Italian car event, because this year it was not! When even Ferraris must park at nearly the end of the banked parking area there is clearly a problem. If you think that we are bellyaching about this, imagine what the Surrey Ferrari Owners Club are doing!!

Firstly I apologise that I didn't get a chance to speak to the owners of the main group of Coupes, I thought I'd have a bit more time at my disposal but the other half had other ideas! I got to speak to a few of you which was good....nice to break the ice with some like minded people.

I'm new to Coupes, but have been to Brooklands once before (2009) if I remember rightly with the Punto guys, and even I noticed that things were quite a bit out of sorts.

I'm a bit annoyed with myself that o didn't get to talk to more of you so hope I didn't appear ignorant...hopefully next time I'll introduce myself a bit better. Was nice meeting 'Thunderbox' & Mrs, who I was parked next to. Also the fella with the camera, 'Fast & Loaded' I think it was. Again, annoyingly can't remember the fellas real name....sorry bud!

Think I saw Gunzi's car outside the bus museum, might be wrong just guessing.

Anyway, hopefully get to meet and speak to more people at future meets!

Yes that was Gunzi's car Mark.

Like others I was pretty annoyed with the organisation this year, I too got caught in the early queues. It was as if they had never run the event before.

Regarding others' points about the way the club display space was totally inadequate. As usual I had provided Phil Ward with an estimate of the number of cars attending. My estimate was 30, pretty close to the actual number. The programme showed us being on the banking with the Fiat forum on the other side.

I think the fact that there would be thirty of us never made it to the marshals directing traffic: Very early on, before I had arrived they were parking random other cars in the space we should have occupied; when I arrived there was room for only another 9 or 10 leaving just 15 of us together.

I am a member of Brooklands Museum trust. Their AGM is in May. I shall be attending it for the first time ever so that they can be made aware of how us owners of non-supercars see their organisation.