Festival of Performance suffers final breakdown
The Argyll Festival of Performance, an annual motorsport festival starting at Inveraray Castle this summer, has been cancelled.
The inaugural twoday festival, billed as a celebration of Scotland’s rich heritage in motorsport, was due to bring cars and drivers from Formula 1, Le Mans, Indy Cars, Touring Cars and International Stage Rallying to Mid Argyll, in the grounds of the historic seat of the Clan Campbell.
The ‘stellar line-up’ included Scottish debuts for the ‘fire-breathing Fiat S76 known as the Beast of Turin’, Jackie Stewart’s Tyrrell 001, and Jim Clark’s Lotus 32B marking 50 years after the F1 world champion’s death, as well as supercars built by McLaren, Ferrari, Bentley, Lamborghini, Maserati and Porsche, and even a vintage bus rally and WWII Spitfire aerial display. Event director Bill Telford said at last year’s launch with the festival’s patron, the Duke of Argyll: ‘Scotland has an enviable reputation in motorsport but, as yet, there has never been an event that celebrates this success. The Argyll Festival of Performance has been created to do just that with a theme each year to really allow the stories to be told.
‘In year one, it will be Formula 1, and Scotland boasts some of the biggest names in the sport from the legendary Jim Clark and Jackie Stewart, to multiple race winners like David Coulthard, and of course, local star, Susie Wolff, who was the first female to be involved in an F1 weekend in 22 years at the British Grand Prix in 2014.
‘The Jim Clark Trust will be our chosen charity for the Festival in 2018.’
But the festival’s website recently announced: ‘On behalf of festival organisers Argyll Motor Club (Ecosse) Ltd, it is with the deepest of regret we announce that Argyll Festival of Performance scheduled for June 2-3 2018 is now cancelled.’
Organisers told The Oban Times: ‘A number of factors have now combined which make it unachievable to deliver the festival to the standard and format we had planned and as a result, we have made the very difficult decision to cancel the event.
‘We would like to thank all those who have shown their support for the festival and to apologise for any inconvenience this cancellation may cause.
‘Those that purchased tickets have already been contacted by the ticket agent and issued with a refund.’