Spring Adventure
Patrick Cruywagen reports back from the Land Rover Spring Adventure held recently at the Driffield Showground
We report on the annual show at Driffield
LAND Rover shows are funny things. They come, they go, they reinvent themselves and they come back again. The recent Land Rover Spring Adventure held at the Driffield Showgrounds and presented by Live Promotions, most definitely falls into this category. Some of you may remember there was a Land Rover show held at this very same venue several years ago. Now it was back again, at the expense of the Scottish Land Rover Show which ran for three years. There is definitely the demand for a Land Rover show up north. As this was a May Bank Holiday weekend, there was another Land Rover Show on at the same time, the Land Rover Legends show at Bicester Heritage. Though if truth be told the two shows are really aimed at very different audiences. I think it would be fair to classify Driffield as the more traditional offering.
The show opened at 10.30am with a ‘through the ages’ parade in the arena to kick things off. Though if like me you had set up camp or the LRM stand the night before then things actually kicked off with a bacon butty and a cup of coffee from one of the many food vans. LRM ran a very successful subscriptions campaign at the show, new subscribers that signed up for a year were given a classy Outwell camping chair worth £50. Existing subscribers who came over to our stand to say hello were given a free copy of our Defender workshop magbook so everyone left the LRM stand happy! We will be running the same offer at the Kelmarsh Land Rover Show.
Then in another first LRM did a guess the engine challenge in the arena. Contestants were blindfolded and placed on a comfy Outwell chair. They then had to guess the engine of the Land Rover that was driving past them. It was certainly tougher than it sounds. Thanks to Britpart and Front Runner UK for providing the prizes for the winners.
The arena saw action throughout the day and one of the highlights was when Steve Miller from our advertising department decided to drive a new Discovery up the Flatdog Twist Off Ramp. Obviously it was never going to be as good as
“Much to their delight there were a few rollovers”
some of the heavily modified D1s and D2s but it certainly performed better than any other standard vehicle that dared to have a go. One of the tricks Steve employed to get it a few cms further up the ramp was to disengage the Dynamic Stability Control.
One of my favourite stands at the show was the Ex-military Land Rover Association one. It had such a superb array of vehicles on display and they were all in combat-ready mode. The most popular arena activity was the ‘test your nerve’ demo where heavily-modified Land Rovers drove over some extremely technical obstacles. Much to the show attendees delight there were a few rollovers. Some on purpose though just to demonstrate that they could recover themselves even when on their side!
They say a game of football consists of two halves. This was a show of two very different days. The first sunny, bright and busy. The second less busy, rainy and by early afternoon traders started to pack up. This is starting to become a feature of the quieter shows. I really feel sorry for people who have driven a long way; they definitely don’t get their money’s worth if the stands are empty.
Often when a show returns or starts up at a new venue then the trade and punters say they will see how the first year goes. Personally I liked the venue, the question now is will the attendance increase in 2020?