Economic woes take a back seat as petrolheads rev up to hit Top Gear
Tens of thousands of petrolheads will descend on the Citywest venue to see the BBC presenters join in the celebration of all things motoring over the weekend.
By all accounts, Ireland is one of the trio’s favourite destinations with Clarkson recently describing Dublin in an interview “as the best city in the world to go out in”.
His pint-sized co-presenter Richard Hammond was also effusive in his praise of the Irish Top Gear Festival audiences.
“You lot really are the rowdiest, loudest and warmest crowd on the circuit and I don’t think there’s any other audience in the world that quite enjoys seeing us fall over and fail as much as the Irish,” he said.
The festival will include the first ever purpose-built Top Gear Track which as well as hosting the Top Gear Sprint Challenge will also feature a never before seen line-up of supercars including the Porsche Carrera GT, Ferrari Enzo, Pagani Zonda and Lamborghini Gallardo.
The festival will be paying tribute to Irish motor racing hero Eddie Jordan where Michael Schumacher’s “first drive” F1 car, Damon Hill’s winning car from the ’98 season and Rubens Barrichello’s Jordan 194 will all take centre stage.
Visitors will have the opportunity to come within touching distance of the many machines in the track paddock.
This year, the event moved to Citywest as part of its move from a “show” to a motoring festival.
The new venue offers 30 acres including a wide variety of live outdoor performances including monster truck and powerbike displays and prodrift demonstrations. Three floors of the exhibition space feature rare prestige and performance cars such as the Bugatti Veyron.
Some additional tickets for the Top Gear festival are still available at the box office at the Citywest centre and are priced from €59.
- Stop by the first-ever Top Gear Track, with non-stop time-trial pursuits, rallies, showcases and supercar sprints featuring The Stig.
- See outdoor performances, such as monster truck shows, motorbike stunt performances, pro-drifting, test drives, dream rides and lots more.
- Get up close and personal with the track cars and their drivers in the track paddock .
- Watch the all-new live theatre show, Top Gear Live, with Jeremy Clarkson and Co
- Walk around three floors of “caraphernalia” in the motor exhibition, including the hall of fame, classic cars and world of Top Gear.
- Eddie Jordan tribute, featuring Michael Schumacher’s “first drive” F1 car, Damon Hill’s winning car from the 1998 season and Rubens Barrichello’s Jordan 194.
- Super cars will include a Porsche Carrera GT, Ferrari Enzo, Pagani Zonda and Lamborghini Gallardo.
- The all-Ireland sprint challenge, featuring Eugene Donnelly, Gareth MacHale and Craig Breen drifting at Top Gear Live.
- Celebrity challenges.
- Manufacturer collections.
- Superbikes live, featuring Mattie Griffin
- Pro-drifting displays featuring Shane Lynch.
