Cholmondeley Pageant of Power 15th, 16th and 17th JUNE 2012

I'll be up that way in Runcorn but pushing it a bit to say yes ...depends what happens on the rollers

[BIG_MVS]

Another wet one at Chumley

Club area was closed and the organisers had little idea where to send us. In the end we just parked in the public car park. Met up with Jason and JohnB, had a look round and then headed off home. Yet again the weather makes what could be a cracking event into a Glastonbury esque wash out

Hi to all.
Arrived @ about 10am and hi agree they didnt have a clue !!!!
We stayed till about 5pm but only because i had friends actually racing and could talk and keep out of the rain.
Venturi running as well can be expected in this bloody weather.
see you Sun weather permitting
Paul D

Not surprised at all that the car clubs area was closed. We did go on Friday and went into the area. It was a complete bog. I got stuck and had to get towed by a tractor. It was like driving on snow/ice until getting bogged down. I wasn't the first or the last though.

Only managed to get out again by carefully planning a route across the reserved area where no cars had been on and where there were areas of ground that were not completely submerged under water. From what I saw, I would have been gobsmacked if they'd even bothered trying to get cars in through Gate 3 on Saturday!

The event itself was pretty good as usual although everything was pretty much as it was last year. There didn't appear to be much different or new. The best thing was that due to being in the car clubs area, we didn't need a ticket so the day didn't cost anything. £100 saved on that at least!

Such a shame as it would be such a great event if we had the weather. Seems a long time since that sunny weekend at Prescott (that was so unbelieveably good!)

[johnb]

This was the designated club area, next to the Lancias, which we weren't allowed to access. The cars there must have arrived on Friday. Shame about the weather.

The weather, poor organisation and the perpetual erosion of car club discounts and privileges has turned me off this event. Having said that I was always most impressed with the quality of those cars etc that competed, some seriously impressive equipment.

It is a pity because this could be such a very good event.

I'm afraid this was probably the last time i'll be visiting Chumley for a while. I know the organisers cannot do anything about the poor weather, bt they could be better prepared.
John has already said gate 3 for the car club stands was effectively useless and therefore closed on the Friday, but the organisers did nothing to stop people turning up there on the Saturday morning. Once there we we directed back to the public entrance 2miles away, which I had passed once.
Once in the public carpark, it was chaos. For £30 a ticket, you expect better.

Yes, I'm afraid events like La Vie en Bleu show this up. I honestly think Chumley has all the makings to be great BUT I get the feeling the 'Toffs' are in it to make a few extra for themselves and there isn't much regard for the general public who had to pay a very healthy sum this year. I was fortunate as I didn't pay anything on Friday but I would have been a bit peed off if I'd had to fork out £30 (each) of my hard earned for it.

I honestly think anyone showing a car should get a half price ticket at least and the car clubs area really should be in a better location. It's almost a shove it over there well out of the way kind of attitude. It really should be a bigger part of the whole show.

I knew on Friday it would be a disaster. I did give Martin the heads up so that he had some kind of fore warning of what would occur. But the organisers of Chumley should have organised it far better, it was obvious that there was going to be all sorts of problems as soon as you got cars going over that ground. I would love to know how long it took them on Saturday to stop cars coming in to Gate 3. Was it actually closed from the off or did they start bringing cars in despite what had happened oon Friday.

I do like the event but the organisers really need to have a good hard think about things before CarFest North and next years event.

This is copied from a Porsche OC site. Sums it up well I think..

I had seen the car entry lists from previous runnings of CPoP so I'd like to think my expectations of the event were "reasonable". I wasn't anticipating anything on the scale of Goodwood or the Silverstone Classic. The event itself would probably have satisfied me over a leisurely weekend in decent weather, particularly if we'd had some good car-club banter going on.

What disappointed was the poor camping area which was singularly lacking in facilities or preparedness. A waterlogged, sloping, un-mown field which rapidly turned into impassable mud with half a dozen portaloos frankly isn't good enough. Once my car was in there on Thursday night it was stuck. No chance of taking it down to the club area, no chance of taking it out in the evening to find a nice local restaurant... stuck. From Friday afternoon onwards they were towing cars INTO the camping area with tractors. That went on for much of Friday night so sleep was "difficult". In case you think I am exaggerating just how bad the field is, let me tell you that Land Rovers and other 4x4s were having to be towed around by tractors too. They couldn't cope with the conditions in that field either.

The car club area was much Sean described. Another area of lumpy, saturated ground which hadn't seen a mower in quite some considerable time. The access "roads" were appalling. Car clubs and their members spend a lot of time getting cars looking good for these events and it is reprehensible for them to be treated so poorly.

This obviously wasn't a one-off mistake. The MX5 Owner's Club was camped in the field next to us, had been going to Cholmondeley for several years and knew the drill. They'd reserved a camping space, marked it out and brought their own ride-on mower along to cut the grass both in the camp site and down in the club display area. They'd brought along a 4x4 "support vehicle", towing for the purposes of, and they'd also arranged with the organisers to take their cars down on Friday night by driving along the track itself after the Friday sessions.

CPoP had ample warning of awful weather this weekend and ample time to make contingency. They didn't. That's where they failed in my opinion.

although i agree with most of the comments Sunday was far better.
good weather and good racing. at least some of you could have turned
up i got on to the field no problem this morning.
1 lonely Venturi
Silverstone classic next which i think you all agree is a cracking event.
PaulD

Response and future event suggestion from Chumley here

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We wanted to write to all the Clubs attending, both to thank you for your amazing support, despite the circumstances and to apologize that we were unable to stick to our normal plans for car parking. With the torrential rain already falling on wet ground, we went from plan b, through c, d and e in very short time, but we were thrilled we managed to keep the show on the road, when up and down the country, others were being cancelled.

Car and Bike Clubs suffered the brunt of the changes and because of that, as well as wanting to thank you for your perseverance, we would like to arrange a Club event at Cholmondeley in the Autumn. I am asking Pippa to liaise with Club Secretaries to see when is most appropriate, but we had in mind a Sunday morning Rally on the Polo Straight in October, followed by some parade laps round the Cholmondeley Circuit. Further details will follow and I look forward to hearing your thoughts from Pippa.

Many thanks again,

James
James Hall
Event Director

The Cholmondeley Pageant of Power

[BIG_MVS]

I never got that email/letter but at least they are apologising and hold their hands up. 2 pics from the day:

Club Stand:



Johnb's lovely A110:



What should have been our Club Stand: