Festival of Speed 2006 – St. Petersburg, Florida

Over the weekend of February 25-26th, St Petersburg, my "home town" hosted it’s very own car show, held overlooking the waters of Tampa Bay in the spacious grounds of the Vinoy Hotel Downtown.

Having become used to the usual Florida car shows, which seem to feature endless rows of muscle cars, Corvettes and Hotrods (and nothing wrong with them, except to say that they become boring after a while), I was gobsmacked to find a VERY different sort of car show being staged at the Vinoy.

There’s no doubt that the organizers are attempting to emulate the Pebble Beach and Amelia Island concours and, from what I saw on the Sunday morning, they’re succeeding.

As you can see from the photos, there were some really special cars, with a distinctly European flavor, such as no less than two Maserati MC12s on display, one a race version, several old Ferraris (including a 250 GT Boano, a 375) and several modern ones too. There was also a Porsche GT-1, an Abarth Porsche from the late ’50s, and a couple of 935s. Also seen was the old front-engined Panoz show car, an IRL car there to publicize the forthcoming St. Petersburg Grand Prix, and that most glorious of DTM Racecars, the Mercedes CLK-GTR.

On the "street" side, there were numerous Porsche 997s, a 1929 Bentley 4.5-liter and its modern counterpart, the Bentley GT, to me, the best looking of the modern, truly "available" supercars. On the pre-war front, as well as the Bentley 4.5-liter, there was also a lovely BMW 328 and an Auburn 851 "Boattail" Speedster.

My personal hits of the show were three V12 aero engines from World War II, the Rolls Royce Merlin and Griffon, and a Continental 1430. Graham White (who I spent some time chatting with and who has written many books and articles about these piston engines, the epitome of their breed) is the owner of these wonderful old beasts and each one was tied down to it’s own individual trailer. They were due to be started and run at 2 p.m., an event I sadly missed, as I had to go attend my own Birthday party back home!

On leaving the show, and walking back to where my car was parked, I found a great old VW-engined buggy by the kerbside, complete with canvas roof. Looking deliberately dilapidated in fading matt green paint, and named "The Mule", it made a poignant counterpoint to all the gloss assembled within the showgrounds. Good on ’yer, whoever made it and brought it along.